
Qass 

Book . 



N 



1726. 



1876. 



An Account of the Observance of the 



ONE HUHDilED/ND FIFTIETH /Nt^lVERSAl^Y 



ORGANIZATION 







WILTON, CONN., JUNE 22, 1876, 



INCLUUINli A 



HISTORICAL ADDRESS, 



By SAMUEL G. WILLARD, 



A POEM, 



By JOHN G. DAVENPORT. 



NEW YORK: 

R. J. Johnston, Printer, i8i Williatn St. 
1876. 



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(0cluJ-a ( cl (J^t^T^-^iUjLPLMLj 



INTRODUCTION. 



At the Annual Meeting of the Wilton Congregational 
Church, held January 7th, 1876, the Pastor, Deacons and 
Standing Committee were authorized to make arrange- 
ments tor an appropriate celebration of the One Hundred 
and Fiftieth Anniversary of the Organization of this Church 
in the month of June following. 

At the first meeting of the Committee, Rev. Samuel G. 
WiLLARD, of Colchester, was invited to prepare an Address 
for the occasion and Rev. John G. Davenport, of Bridge- 
port, a Poem. At this meeting the Committee voted to add 
to their number the Society's Committee. 

After repeated meetings the following invitation and order 
of exercises was prepared and sent (so far as their address 
could be obtained) to all natives of the town holding former 
relations to this Church and Society : 

1726. 1876. 

ONE HUNDBED AND FIFTIETH ANNIVEKSABY 

OF THE 

WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH 

AND SOCIETY, 

Thttksday, June 22d, 1876. 



You are respectfully invited to meet with the friends of this 
Church and Society, on Thursday, June 22d, at half -past 10, A. M., 
and share in the privileges of the occasion. 

Hon. Chables Jones, of New York, has been invited to act 
as President of the day. 

The Address of Welcome will be given by Rev. S. J. M. 
Merwin, Pastor. 

Response by Rev. James W. HuBBEiiii, of New Haven. 

Historical Address by Rev. S. G. WiLiiAED, of Colchester. 

Poem by Rev. J. G. Davenpokt, of Bridgeport. 

The Ladies will provide a Collation, to be served after the close 
of the exercises in the church. 

Please reply to 

Rev. S. J. M. MERWIN, or EDWARD OLMSTEAD. 

Rev. H. N. Dunning and Rev. D. R. Austin, of South Nor- 
walk, with Rev. Dr. N. Bouton, of Concord, N. H., con- 



4 INTRODUCTION. 

ducted the devotional exercises, and the Choir of the Church, 
led by Mr. K. J. Johnston, chorister, furnished the music 
for the occasion. Mr. Frank Comstock presided at the 
Organ. 

After the Collation the Church was again filled, and the 
remainder of the day spent in listening to addresses from 
Eev. E. Mix, of Orange, N. J., Kev. Dr. Nathaniel Bouton, 
of Concord, K H., Rev. H. N. Dunning, of South Norwalk, 
Eugene Smith, Esq., and C. L. Westcott, Esq., of New 
York, and others. 

The meeting was closed with singing " Hold the Fort." 
By vote, the Historical Address, Poem, and other Ad- 
dresses of the morning were ordered to be printed. 

Eev. S. J. M. Merwin, | Publication 
Dea. Edward Olmstead, f Committee. 

Wilton, Conn., July 29th, 1876. 



PROCEEDINGS. 



The exercises were commenced by the Pastor, the Rev. 
S. J. M. Merwin, calUng upon Charles Jones, Esq., of New 
York, to occupy the Chair. He was received with a 
hearty welcome. Mr. Jones said — 

Ladies and Gentlemen: I thank you for this cordial 
greeting. I confess that it was with some reluctance that I 
accepted the invitation of your Committee to preside on 
this occasion, because I thought, as I doubt not many of you 
now think, that the place woald be better filled by a perma- 
nent resident of the town and one sustaining official relations 
to the Church and congregation ; but still I do not feel that I 
am an alien or a stranger here. None of 5 ou have a stronger 
or a warmer affection for this good old town than I have. 
And pleasant and agreeable as are my associations in the 
city where I live (the City of Brooklyn) and where so many 
of the men and women of New England take up their resi- 
dence, no school-boy so longs for his vacation as I long for 
the return of Summer, when I can come home again to the 
rest which I always find in this quiet place — the place I 
know and love so well. Its hills and its valleys, its woods 
and its cultivated fields, its meadows and its orchards, its 
running brooks, its byways and highways — I know them all 
so well and so intimately that they have come to form a 
part of my very self. So, ladies and gentlemen, I feel that 
by nativity, in heart, mind, and in my whole being, I am a 
Wiltonian, and it gives me pleasure to join with you in the 
exercise? of this day. 



6 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

We have come up here, on this bright and beautiful Sum- 
mer morning, with loving hearts, to record our homage for 
the Christian men and women who, one hundred and fifty 
years ago, planted here a Church — a Church which to-day is 
older by a half century than the nation. And it is good for 
us to be here as children. " Honor thy father and thy 
mother " is the Divine command, and, during all the cen- 
turies since it was delivered from the smoking mount to man, 
it has always found an echo in the heart of every loving, 
dutiful child. And we are especially bound — we, the sons 
and daughters of New England, are called upon by every 
sentiment of affection, of gratitude, of reverence, aye, of 
pride, even — to honor and hold in remembrance the heroic 
men and women who planted on the soil of New England 
the Free Church, from which have sprung a Free State and a 
Free Nation ! 

My friends, we do take pride, and we justly take pride, in 
our ancestry. For have we not seen the great work which 
they did, all unconsciously to themselves, and h(^w world- 
wide has been its influence? Yes, my friends, as clearly as 
you can track the course of an overflowing river through an 
arid waste by the verdure on its banks, just as clearly can 
you trace the stream of New England civilization in its flow 
from ocean to ocean across the continent, bearing with it 
whatever is best and whatever is noblest in our social, our 
educational and our religious life, the family with its purity, 
the free school and the academy with their faithful teachers, 
the college and the university with their learned professors, 
and above all, and greatest of all, the Church with its mes- 
sengers of peace and love. 

Ladies and gentlemen, the pilgrim spirit is not dead — no, 
the pilgrim spirit is not dead. "It walks in the moon's 
broad light, and it watches by the bed of the glorious dead 
with the holy stars at night." And if it so be that by the 
commemoration services of this day we shall catch somewhat 
more of that spirit and carry it with us from this place, it 
will not be in vain that we have met here to do honor to 
the little band of Christian men and women who planted 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 7 

here a Churcli which has been a source of comfort and bless- 
ing to the generations that have come and gone during the 
one hundred and fifty years of its existence. (Applause.) 

An Anthem — "Jehovah's Praise" — was then sung by the 
Choir ; the Solo being sung by Mrs. Samuel Marvin, daugh- 
ter of the Chorister. 

The Rev. Mr. H. N. Dunning, of South Norwalk, read the 
145th Psalm. 

The Chairman — Rev. Mr. Merwin will extend a Wel- 
come to the Wiltonian pilgrims who have come up here 
to day. 

REMARKS OF REV. MR. MERWIN. 
This pleasant duty has been devolved upon me by the 
Committee, and, as I told the brother who is to follow me, I 
suppose all I have to say is, "We are very glad to see you." 
But he says if I stop there all he shall say will be '* Thank 
you — very much obliged." So I suppose I must go on a 
little further ; and indeed it is in my heart to express to you 
our most sincere pleasure at seeing so many of you here on 
this occasion ; that the Lord has favored us with such beauti- 
ful weather, and that so many of you have left your house- 
hold cares and your domestic duties, your farms and your 
merchandise, your offices and your school-rooms, and your 
various occupations, and come up to help us celebrate this One 
Hundred and Fiftieth Anniversary of the Organization of our 
Church. And we feel that we ought to extend a special wel- 
come to all of you who have ever been connected with this 
Church, and that covers more ground, perhaps, than you sup- 
pose. Not only do we welcome those of you who were bap- 
tized in this Church, and those of you who here came forward 
and publicly professed your faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, and 
those of you who brought letters from other Churches and 
thus united with this Church of Christ, but also all whose 
parents or grandparents or great-grandparents were ever con- 
nected with this Church ; and this, as I said, perhaps covers 
more ground than you suppose — for one hundred and fifty 



8 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

years ago all persons were required by law to attend 
Church on Sundays, Fast Days and Thanksgiving, under 
penalty of a fine of five shillings for every absence ; and 
therefore it is to be presumed that one hundred and fifty 
years ago all the people went to Church. And for 
more than fifty years this was the only Church here 
in Wilton, so that those of you who have ever lived in Wil- 
ton, or have come down from the old Wilton families are 
more or less connected with this old Wilton Church ; and the 
mother to-day hails you all as her children, even though 
some of you may have wandered away into the Methodist 
woods, or gone down into the deep waters of the Baptist per- 
suasion, or taken refuge in the Episcopal fold. We hail you 
all as common children of this mother Church, and as re- 
joicing in the prosperity of the kingdom of our Lord and 
Saviour Jesus Christ. 

And we welcome you back to these old hills and these 
fields where, in early days, you gathered wild flowers and 
strawberries, and to these old school-houses where you sat 
down on the hard slab-seats and carved your names to Yan- 
kee immortality, and to this Church of Christ where you 
came, some of you, perhaps, sitting in the gallery seats and 
leaving on the walls a record which you hoped might be un- 
dying — but the whitewasher's brush has wiped it off long ere 
this. 

To-day, let the lawyer forget his clients, and the judge his 
court, and the doctor his patients (perhaps they will be all 
the better for it), and the teacher his pupils, and the ladies 
their domestic cares (at least those of you who have come from 
abroad). We want you all to be boys and girls again, and 
bring up the memories of old times, especially after you have 
gone out from these walls and are gathered together on this 
old GreeU; where so many of you played ball when you 
were boys. 

For some two or three hours, perhaps, we will stay in 
school and listen to our masters, and learn well the lessons 
they have to teach us, and then — you know how there never 
was a time when we had such wild delight and joyous glee 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 9 

as when school was out and we rushed out of doors. So, 
when we have listened here for a while, we shall be all the 
more readj to participate in the festivities of the occasion. 

The Chairman — The Rev. James W. Hubbell, a native 
of Wilton, but now a resident of New Haven, will respond 
to the Address of "Welcome. 

REMARKS OF REV. MR. HUBBELL. 

Oltr friend here, in his very kind welcome, has gone so 
far beyond the short address he had thought to give us, that 
if to that, I should have had nothing to say but "thank you," 
now after all he has so well said, I do not feel equal to the 
occasion. Especially when I find, Mr. Chairman, that over 
and above all that he has said, we had been so beautifully 
and profusely welcomed by the flowers in the vestibule, 
by this old sanctuary putting on to-day such a glad and 
welcome attire, by all these faces so dear and familiar, whose 
every radiant feature has spoken welcome. 

AVhy, sir, these many-toned welcomes have made us feel 
at home again, as though we had not really lost our inherit- 
ance here ; that we are not aliens or strangers — but have a 
fellowship with these Saints and with this Household of God. 
It is said that the sons of old England, wherever they roam, 
carry home with them, and though exiled and expatriated 
they belong to old England still. So it is, sir, with some of 
lis who find ourselves coming back here with no home to 
visit; the old places in the possession of strangers; no rights 
here in property; the familie- scattered, yet this dear old 
town still is and ever will be our home. 

It is good to come up to Zion on this anniversary day to 
recall the scenes of the past ; to recall the faces and the 
names that had almost faded from memory ; to recall the 
history of this old and honored Church, of its pastors, of its 
deacons, of its members. It is good for each of us to come 
back to the beginning of things; to trace back the roots 
of our lives to their sources and to find them fed from deep 
and hidden springs among these hills. It is good for us to 



10 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

see what influences helped shape us and to ask whether we 
have been faithful to our early teachings and vows. 

Thomas Arnold of Rugby has said that when boys have 
graduated from school, and have passed on into earnest life, 
that however much they may have been neglected or abused, 
however distasteful their school life may have been at the 
time of it, they will love to revisit the scenes of their youth, 
and they will remember with only gratitude all that was 
done for them. So does it seem to us all ; out of whatever 
divergent paths we come back to this one place where we 
were wont to meet on Sabbath days. This place to which, 
perhaps, some of us did not come so willingly and so thank- 
fully as we come this morning. 

And, oh, what a charm memory has, to touch with her 
magic wand scenes long past, and make them present once 
more — to touch the graves on yonder hill side, and make 
them give up their dead, to lead them in long procession, so 
that they shall walk these aisles once more, and sit here 
before us in their old places, with their old familiar look, to 
sing and pray, and listen and sleep, as they used to do in 
those far off days. What a power has memory that she can 
touch this comely sanctuary as it is to-day with its new- 
fangled fresco and organ, with its modern pulpit and pews, 
and convert them into that old meeting-house of five and 
thirty years ago, so dear and familiar to some of us, with its 
plain walls and lofty pulpit, with its majestic sounding-board 
above it, and the square, straight-back pews, and the lofty 
galleries with that tremendous choir, fiddle, base-viol and all ! 

I say for myself (and I am sure 1 am uttering the senti- 
ments of all these boys and girls, young and old, who have 
returned here that they might join in these festivities), if we 
have reaped any success in life, if at the bar or in the pulpit, 
if as teachers, if as men of business and cares, we have been 
or are being useful in our generation, it is one of the greatest 
pleasures we have, to claim this dear old town as our native 
place, and this Church, where our fathers worshipped, as the 
hallowed spot where those good men that are gone sprinkled 
us in holy baptism and taught us in the way of life, where 



WILTOX CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 11 

we had our first thoughts of God and of eternity, where many 
of us, in the enthusiasm of early youth, consecrated ourselves 
to God and our generation. 

It is with feelings of pride, pardonable on this memorial 
day, that we recall the honorable names of both living and 
dead, of both men and women, who have gone from this 
Church. More than a score of them have passed, and some of 
them with high honors, through collegiate and professional 
study ; one of them has a name conspicuous not only in our 
own land and in this century, but conspicuous throughout 
all lands where the Bible is studied. I am reminded here 
of an incident of this distinguished scholar, Professor Moses 
Stuart, told me recently by one who heard it, that after 
preaching in this Church two or three Sabbaths during a 
vacation, as he often did to the delight of the people, the 
Pastor said, just before his sermon on the following Sabbath: 
" My dear people, you have had one of your distinguished 
sons to preach, for a few times, most remarkable sermons ; 
you must now be content to put up with more common 
fare." And I would not forget the many distinguished men 
who were here in preparatory study ; some of them we are 
glad to see present today, who were earnest helpers in this 
Church, and whose memories are yet fragrant. 

But I must not continue these thoughts, but leave them 
for others who are to follow me. Allow me to say in closing, 
that this day is one of peculiar joy to us boys and girls who 
return here, and we wish to thank you all for your very kind 
greetings. But to some of us there are sad thoughts as 
we return to find voices that welcomed in the past, now 
hushed in death, and hands that used to grasp ours in wel- 
come, now forever still. We find strangers living where we 
used to dwell; only let us resolve as we go hence, that 
we will teach our children the principles that were taught 
us, and that we will train them, as we were traine 1, for use- 
fulness on earth and for happiness in heaven ; so that the 
lives of those who have gone before will be perpetuated in 
the generations that are to follow. 

I would close with the following sentiment : This day of 



12 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

June, auspiciously one of the longest of the year, with a 
profusion of flowers and evergreens ; may it be to this 
Church the symbol and the prophecy of a long day of un- 
fading beauty and blessedness — the beauty of holiness — the 
blessedness of usefulness ; and when it at last closes, to close 
only to open into the brightness of the eternal morning, 
where gladder bells shall usher in the day. 

The following Hymn, composed for the occasion by Miss 
Elizabeth Stuart Phelps, granddaughter of Prof Moses 
Stuart, a native of Wilton, was then sung by the Choir: 

God of the centuries ! who art 
The Home of every homeless heart, 
The "Wisdom to our foolishness. 
The Rest of all our weariness. 

We are too dull to understand 
The gentle pressure of Thy hand ; 
Too blind to see (or cold to try) 
The light of love within Thine eye. 

Lost children in the mystery 
That darkens 'twixt our souls and Thee, 
We join our trembling hands and cry, 
" Show Thyself to us, or we die !" 

In the dim thicket called Thy Church 
We grope for Thee — ! to our search 
Be growing Light. While weak we roam, 
Be Strength, be Hope, be Love, be Home. 

We bless the gloom in which Thou art. 
We hear the beatings of Thy heart — 
Across the shadow tortuous, 
Oil, God ! we know it beats for us. 

O ! clasp us to it ! — hold us there ! 
Till some glad day tlie dawn breaks fiir, 
Till on the sweet far plains it fall, 
And Truth for one is Truth for all. 



WILTON CONGEEGATIONAL CHURCH. 13 

The Chairman — We have reached the point of chief 
interest in our Anniversary proceedings. The Historical 
Address will now be delivered by a gentleman born in this 
town, taught in its schools, and early connected with this 
Church — the Rev. Samuel G. Willard. Although he, at 
the present time, ministers to a people in a remote part of the 
State (Colchester), yet neither distance nor absence has 
weakened his affection for this place and this Church. 

HISTORICAL ADDRESS. 

The words of the Psalmist that may fitly introduce the 
outline of a History of this Church, which its Committee have 
invited me to prepare for this the One Hundred and Fiftieth 
Anniversary of its Organization, may be found in the first verse 
of the fortj'-fonrth Psalm : 

" We have hearp with ouk ears, O God ! 
Our fathers have told us, 
What work thou didst in their days, 
In the times of old." — Psalm 4A: 1. 

The hopeful face of youth is towards the future, the eye 
of age scans pensively the past. Youth sees in mementoes of 
departed years gray hairs, wrinkles, decrepitude, and the 
gloom of the grave, while the days to come are spanned by 
the bow of promise, and scarcely darkened save by the 
shadows of coming achievements. Age sees in the same di- 
rection dubious pleasures, and certain sorrow ; but in the 
past, treasures of experience and of wisdom ; worthy to be 
diligently sought out. 

To the young the reminiscences of their grandparents are 
often without interest. But in later life, they may vainly re- 
gret the lost opportunity to learn from lips which death long 
ago sealed. 

The people of New England, in the vigorous youth of the 
nation, were for two centuries or more so intensely occupied 
with the difficulties of laying the foundations of government, 
and in maintaining liberty, civil and religious, that they had 
scanty opportunity to record their deeds. But in the last 



14 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

generation, a desire to know who and what those brave and 
wise men were, has stimulated a search among the memo- 
rials of their lives, which time has spared. 

The anniversary of a settlement of a town, or of the organ- 
ization of a church, has been made the occasion to revive, lor 
the satisfaction of the living and the instruction of those that 
may succeed them, the worthy deeds of the founders and of 
their successors. 

Twenty-five years ago, the Two Hundredth Anniversary 
of the settlement of Norwalk, of which Wilton was for above 
one hundred and fifty yeai's a part, was duly celebrated, and 
a Historical Discourse delivered, by Rev. Nathaniel Bouton, 
D.D., of Concord, New Hampshire, who was a native of Nor- 
walk, and who, by his presence, honors this occasion. Four 
years earlier, Rev. Edwin Hall, D.D., then pastor of the 
First Church in Norwalk, and now Emeritus Professor of 
Theology in the Seminary at Auburn, N. Y., had laid the 
people of Norwalk and vicinity under lasting obligations, by 
diligently copying out and publishing, town, society and other 
ancient records.^ 

Seventy -five years younger than the honored mother, this 
Church, to-day, in the maturity of her powers, but without a 
gray lock or a furrow of care, glowing with youth and beauty 
whch we fondly believe may be immortal, calls her chil- 
dren to rejoice with her, that the Heavenly Father has brought 
her prosperously to the end of the third half century of her 
existence. 

As the parish was for three-quarters of a century in its 
boundaries nearly identical with the town that now is, a full 
history of the Church for that period would include a history 
of the town. But as this is the Anniversary of the organiza- 
tion of the Church and not of the Town, much that would 
belong to a history of the latter, must needs be omitted. 

The period under review is, in one aspect, not long ; for 
there are those now members of the Church whose grand- 
parents were living at its beginning. Possibly there may be 
some here, who have spoken with one or more individuals 
who were living at that time. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 15 

And jet the materials for a history of this sort, so far as 
known, are not abundant. The pious care of the second 
minister, and of some of his successors in office, the more or 
less imperfect records of the Ecclesiastical Society, are the 
chief, direct and original contributions to this history in the 
possession of the Church and Society. From the records of 
Norwalk, from old account books, letters and manuscripts 
hid away in old attics, much, no doubt, might be gleaned. 
And there should be letters in the hands of descendants of 
Wilton families, whose residence is in some other place, letters 
dating, some of them at least, a hundred years back, which 
would furnish most interesting information. Mr. Philip Betts 
made, nearly twenty years since, an abstract of the Society re- 
cords and of a portion of the Church records, which 1 have 
been permitted to consult in the preparation of this discourse. 
The original records — except notes from the earlier portion, 
made sixteen or seventeen years since in summer vacations — 
have not been in my reach during the short interval allowed 
for the work. 

At the outset, a brief notice of the settlement of this town 
may claim attention. 

From the time of the founding of New Haven in 1638 un- 
til 1690, most of the towns organized, in what is now Connec- 
ticut, unless near Hartford, were on the shore of the sound. 
As the inhabitants increased, the disposition to emigrate, 
which continues to this day, was seen. After the death of 
Philip (in 1676) released the people from the fear of Indian 
violence, they began to push northward. Between 1690 and 
1725, a considerable number of townships were formed ad- 
joining the shore towns on the north. Some time during 
this period, lands were taken up and houses built in what is 
now Wilton. Tradition says that the house in Norwalk, near 
the Wilton line, known as the Odell place, was built over two 
hundred years ago by a Mr. Whitney, and that a house in 
Cranberry Plain built by a Mr. Gregory is somewhat older. 
The first house south of the Kent school-house is reported 
to be about as old.* Another tradition has it, that the house 

* Charles M. Gregory, Norwalk. 



16 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

north of the school-house, across the street, formerly occupied 
by Rev. Mr. Gaylord, was raised on the same day. These tra- 
ditions may be accepted for what they are worth. In 1685, 
eight families, all fi'om Norwalk, save one from Stratford, be- 
gan the settlement of Danbury, and in 1708 a company of 
Norwalk men purchased land and began to settle Ridgefield. 
A committee was appointed in 1713 to lay out a highway 
from Norwalk thither. In 1725 the inhabitants in Kent, Bel- 
den's Hill and Chestnut were sufficiently numerous to ask to 
be made a separate parish. It is therefore highly probable 
that houses began to be built in Wilton at least as early as in 
Ridgefield, and probably as early as 1701. The style of 
building is seen in the houses already named. A common, 
not invariable, fashion, was the two story front, the second 
story in some cases projecting beyond the first ; the rear roof 
extending within six feet of the ground ; the large stone 
chimney in the center with its wide fire-place, the house set 
without regard to the road, so as to indicate the four points of 
the compass, the door nearest the street midway between the 
ends of the house, window frames hardly more than twenty- 
eight by forty inches, and window glass seven inches by nine, 
the whole undisguised by paint out of doors or in. 

The first public movement to form a separate parish was 
December 7, 1725, when the town of Norwalk which was then 
co-terminous with the Ecclesiastical Society : " by a major 
vote, signified their willingness that the inhabitants of Kent, 
Belden's Hill and Chestnut Hill, and so upwards, become a 
parish or village by themselves." At the same meeting a 
committee was appointed " to joyne with a committee from 
ye said inhabitants, in viewing where ye bounds may be best 
fixt for ye said upper village, and make a report to ye tow 
of their opinion." The little brook at the lower end of Ker 
formed a convenient starting point from which the cor 
mittees proceeded east and west, and fixed the bounds su 
stantially where the present bounds of the town are, the 
eastern boundary excepted. 

This period was an era in the history of Norwalk. A new 
town house or the enlargement of the school-house for town 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 17 

meetings must be made ; town meetings must no longer be 
held in the house of worship ; a number of persons are peace- 
fully allowed to draw oif to the Church of England,"* and at 
the same time — there was serious difficulty on account of the 
minister, Rev. Stephen Buckingham, by reason of some irreg- 
ularities in his conduct (the temperance reformation had not 
then begun), which difficulties perhaps hastened the formation 
of the Episcopal Society. An Ecclesiastical Council was called 
to give advice. In the end Mr. Buckingham resigned and 
Rev. Moses Dickinson was installed in 1727. f 

There were thirty-one petitioners to the General Assembly 
in Hartford, that the parish might be constituted. Most of 
the names are, or were within the memory of persons now 
living, still found in this town. The Act of incorporation 
was passed May 12th, 1726. So far as I know, the name 
Wilton, so euphonious and often admired by its people, first 
appears — in this connection — in the petition to the General 
Assembly, and was adopted by that body. Whence the name 
came, we can only conjecture. When the genealogical regis- 
ter of each of the families of the petitioners shall have been 
made, it may be found that one or more of them was descend- 
ed from a family in Wilton, Wiltshire, England, a place of 
much importance even eleven hundred years ago. ^ 

The Prime Ancient Society of Norwalk was disposed to 
deal generously with the new parish. February 28th, 1726, 
it voted "to the inhabitants of ye upper Society, the old pul- 
pit upon free gift," and the next February it voted that the 
Proprietors in Norwalk grant them ten acres of land for " the 
use of ye Presbyterian or Congregational Ministry among them 
forever." Two years later five acres more were given. The 
harmony thus early existing between the two parishes has 
happily continued to this day. 

* Prof. Kingsley, of Yale College, says that at this time there were in Connecticut 
only two or three congregations of Episcopalians, and two of Baptists, all small; no con- 
gregation of Quakers.— Hall's Norwalk, p. 157. 

+ Webster's History of Presbyterian Church, p. 373, says the call was voted August 
19th, and the parish of Wilton concurred in the call the next day. 

t The fouudatiou of its famous Abbey was begun in 773. 



18 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

Whether, however, this Ecclesiastical Society was faithful 
to its trust, when, in 1754, it sold nine acres of this parsonage 
land to Benjamin Betts for £165 14s., old tenor, and, so far as 
appears, used the money for current expenses, is a question. 

In family affairs, sometimes the bride is first obtained, and 
she helps to plan and build the house. In the Christian 
economy, naturally the Church comes first, then the Society 
(if it is necessary to have a Society), and the house of worship 
last, builded by the Church and Society. In this case the 
Society was first, the arrangements for the Church edifice seem 
to have come next, the selection of a Pastor followed, and the 
organization of the Church — the most important step of all 
— came after these. 

It is much to be regretted that there is no account of this 
transaction. The Society records show a meeting (the second, 
or rather an adjourned meeting of that body) on the 12th of 
June, which confirmed the doings of the meeting of June 7th, 
and appointed a committee to make arrangements with some 
of the neighboring Pastors, for organizing a Church and secur- 
ing the settlement of Mr. Sturgeon. They voted to request 
two of the near neighboring Pastors " to attend and assist in 
carrying on a day of fasting and prayer amongst them, to 
look to God for guidance and direction in the affairs before 
them, and in a due and suitable time to obtain the settling of 
the said Mr. Sturgeon." At the same time Jonathan Elmer* 
was chosen "to read the Psalm and John St. John to set the 
tune to the Psalm at all times usual in the public worship." 
As we hear no more of the organization of the Church, but 
find it apparently organized on the 27th of June, though it is 
not mentioned by name, we may conjecture that event to 
have occurred between the Society's meeting of June 14th and 
June 27th, and on that day of fasting and prayer in which the 
two " near neighboring Pastors," according to invitation, were 
present. The Manual of this Church, printed A. D. 1857, 
says it was organized "a^out the 20th of June." But as the 



* The Elmers seem to have been earlier jin Fairfield. Jonathan Elmer, Yale Col- 
lege, 1747, was ordained Pastor, New ProviHeuce, New Jersey, 1750, and remained 43 
years ; he died June 7, 1807. —Webster, pag| 608. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 19 

20tli of June that year was Monday, and therefore a less con- 
venient day than Wednesday, the 22d, we may perhaps be 
permitted to assume that on this latter day, just one hundred 
and fifty years ago, this Church began to be. As the Say- 
brook Platform and Confession was then eighteen years old, 
and fully accepted by the neighboring Churches, we may sup- 
pose that the form of organization and the creed of the Church 
were easily arranged. 

The difficulty of procuring a Pastor, as already stated, was 
soon overcome, June 7th the Society elected Eichard 
Bouton, clerk, and voted unanimously to call Rev. Robert 
Sturgeon to officiate in the work of the ministr}^ amongst 
them, and fixed his salary at " ninety pounds, paramount or 
equivalent to good bills of credit of the Colony of Connecti- 
cut, or other good bills of credit, passing current at the re- 
spective times of payment," and "a full supply of firewood, for 
his family's use," * * "to be brought to his habitation from 
time to time as is needed." Five acres of land were also grant- 
ed for a " house lot." 

Mr. Sturgeon had not been long in this country, and prob- 
ably reached Wilton in April, a^ his salary commenced the 
14th of that month. He was of Scotch, or probably of Scotch- - 
Irish, descent. After completing his studies in his own country, 
the Presbytery, for some reason, declined to give him a license 
to preach. On reaching New England, he was approbated by 
a Council, says a Presbyterian writer,* "greatly to the regret 
of Cotton Mather, who believed that his conduct had justified 
the Presbytery in refusing a license." When or by whom he 
was ordained is not clear. In the Society's record he is called 
Reverend, and is said to have been installed. But an Associa- 
tion must license before a Council could ordain. Who would 
call a Council to ordain a comparative stranger as an evangelist, 
in those days when ordination and installation almost always 
went together, is not apparent. Much to our regret, there is 
no Church record prior to Mr. Gaylord's settlement. The 
time and place of Mr, Sturgeon's ordination remain to be dis- 



* Webster, page 492. 



20 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

covered. At a meeting of the Society, June 27th, the Mon- 
day following the supposed organization of the Church, Mr. 
Sturgeon appeared in the meeting of the Society and formally 
accepted the call. Wednesday, July 20th, was fixed upon for 
the installation. The Committee, appointed to make arrange- 
ments for the Council, consisted of Messrs. James Trowbridge, 
Joseph Birchard, Jonathan Elmer, Nathaniel Ketchum, John 
Taylor, Matthew St. John, and David Lambert. John Tay- 
lor and David Lambert were appointed " to provide for and 
entertain the Ministers and Messengers at the time of the In- 
stallment, " and three months after were voted three pounds 
ten shillings for this service. The installation doubtless oc- 
curred on the day appointed. 

It was a busy year. A house of worship must, if possible, 
be completed before winter. A house must be provided for 
the Pastor. Next Spring a military company must be organ- 
ized, so that men need not go to Norwalk to drill. Highways, 
especially those leading to the Meeting-House, must be put in 
order ; perhaps some new ones opened, and this with as little 
cost as possible to the Society. One or two pounds for stray 
cattle must be provided. A tavern is needed, and in Sep- 
tember, 1727, David Lambert is chosen "taverner." 

The site chosen for the Meeting-House was on the south 
side of the upper road leading from Kent to Belden's Hill, 
near the present railroad track. This was then near the geo- 
graphical center of the population. The dimensions of the 
building are not given. As no vote to erect it is recorded, 
the work was probably begun before the Society was organ- 
ized. The burying-yard shall be near the Meeting-House, for 
we do not dream of a railroad and steam carriages plowing 
through it, as happened in 1851. The 30th of September the 
Society voted " that they would have their Meeting-House 
rectified by laying the floor, and by plastering the walls, and 
by making comfortable seats to set in." John Keeler and 
John St. John were appointed to get this work done. Dea- 
con Hickok, Richard Bouton, John Dunning, John Stuart 
and Matthew St. John were appointed " to search out and 
agree for a convenient piece of land for an house lot" for the 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 21 

Pastor. Matthew St. John was appointed a Committee on 
Meeling-House expenses. 

It was thought that the General Assembly might, in con- 
sideration of these heavy burdens, abate the taxes of the 
Members of the Society for that year, and a committee was 
appointed in vain to look after the matter. 

The work of finishing the Meeting-House made good 
progress. On the 30th of November, in accordance with the 
custom of those days, the Society voted " to seat it," and ap- 
pointed a committee of three to " seat it by list and age, ac- 
cording to the best of their judgment." A delicate task which 
doubtless occasioned a good many heart-burnings. But in 
some form the plan was continued more than half a century 
longer. The order of seating nearly one hundred years ago 
has been- preserved. Seven years later, in 1733, it was voted 
that John St. John should sit with Deacon Elmer " so long 
as he sets ye tune." 

The matter of the Pastor's firewood must now be attended 
to ; he has perhaps suffered in this winter weather. On ttie 
20th of December the Society "voted that every man shall bring 
unto the Reverend Mr. Sturgeon a load of wood within four- 
teen days," and that any man who failed, should forfeit three 
shillings. How much wood this vote secured is not mention- 
ed, but we fear that some men did not regard it, for the 
next December, A. D., 1727, it was voted that those who car- 
ried wood should have three shillings a load for good walnut, 
and two shillings and sixpence a load for good oak wood. 
The next December, 1728, it was voted to give Ebenezer 
Jackson nine pounds to furnish a sufficient supply of wood 
for Mr. Sturgeon, for the ensuing year. In February, 1730, 
it was voted that Mr. Sturgeon should have twenty-eight cords 
of wood annually. Here is something definite — better than 
glittering generalities, and yet some carper may say : '' oak, 
hickory or chestnut? " and, " who is to bring it ? " 

The necessity of a school was soon felt. In Decem- 
ber, 1728, the Ecclesiastical Society appointed Lieutenant 
Ketchum, Joseph Birchard and Ensign St, John " a 
Committee to set up a school or schools in the parish." It 



22 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

was voted to hire Mr. Sturgeon to teach ; also to use the 
"country money," as far as it would go, and to require the 
scholars to make up the deficiency. Sixteen months later the 
parish was divided into three districts; Kent and Chestnut 
Hill formed one; Belden's Hill as far as James Stuart's, a 
second ; and " Pimpewalk" a third, each of which should re- 
ceive one third of the country money. The School on Belden's 
Hill was to be taught in June and July, that in Pimpewalk, 
in August and September, and that in Kent " so long as their 
part [of the money] will come to." In order to increase the 
income of the Society, it was about this time " voted to have 
a flock among them, if they could get liberty from the town." 

In Connecticut, till 1712, the towns had sole charge of 
school matters in their own bounds. Then the parish or 
Ecclesiastical Society (if that included only a portion of the 
town) had the care of their own territory. "In 1750, towns 
and societies were made practically equal in conducting 
school affairs." In 1798, and till 1856, the school society 
alone (and since 1856 the town alone, school societies having 
been then abolished) administered school matters, except 
such as were specially committed to the school district. 

The law, from 1700 to 1820, required the towns to raise 
by tax the sum of forty shillings (except that from 1754 to 
1767 it was less) on every thousand pounds of assessed prop- 
erty, for the use of schools in the town. The proceeds of 
this tax were known as "country money." 

There were frequent votes respecting the schools. In Jan- 
uary, 1792, the parish was divided into nine school districts. 
These were No. 1, Nod ; No. 2, Bald Hill ; No. 3, Middle- 
brook District ; No. 4, Dram Hill ; [Center District] : No. 6, 
Kent; No. 7, Pimpewaug; No. 8, Chestnut Hill; No. 9, 
Harry's Ridge. The Kent school-house stood in the triangle 
east of the Danbury road, and south of the "Old Burying- 
Ground" (as was customary), near the Meeting-House.* 

After a time dissatisfaction with the "life and conversa- 
tion " of Mr. Sturgeon so increased, that the Church consulted 



* The tradition that it was once just north of the present Episcopal Church is, prob- 
ably, not authentic. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 23 

the Association which met at Ripton (now Huntington), in 
November, 1731, and was advised to call a Council. This 
was agreed to in December. By Committee, an understand- 
ing with Mr. Sturgeon was reached ; but to complete the 
arrangement the Society's meeting adjourned to the last day 
of December, "at ye sun one hour high at night." Was 
that hour named to insure punctuality ? 

There is no record of the dismission of Mr. Sturgeon ; but 
as the Society held a meeting in April, 1732, to adopt meas- 
ures to obtain a minister, we may infer that the pastorate of 
Mr. Sturgeon ended the first of that month. 

Not much has come to us of the personal appearance of 
Mr, Sturgeon, or of his sayings and doings. That he was 
able readily to find a text for a sermon is suggested in the 
tradition, that on the day of the arrival of his family, he 
preached from the words, " We have seen strange things 
to-day." There was evidently something in his manner of 
life and way of doing things that after a time made him un- 
acceptable to the majority of his parishioners ; but as they 
made no charges against him before the Council, we are per- 
mitted to believe that a lack of judgment, rather than any 
positive wrong-doing, led to his dismission. There is the 
more reason for this view, since he was afterwards connected 
with the Presbyterian Church, and settled for ten or twelve 
years, not very far from here, m Bedford, New York.* As 
a member of the Presbytery of New York, he was present at 
a meeting of the Synod in 1745. His name is not found 
in that connection after A.D. 1750. William Sturgeon, sup- 
posed to be a son of Rev. Robert Sturgeon, graduated at 
Yale, in the class of 1745, standing fourth in honor; and, 
having crossed the ocean, was ordained, in 1746, first deacon, 
and then priest, in the Church of England. He became 
assistant minister in Christ Church, Philadelphia, where he 
remained till 1766. He died in 1770. 

The Society, April 11th, 1732, chose Deacons Trowbridge 
and Hickok and Jonathan Elmer a Committee " to advise 



* Webster's History of the Presbyterian Church, page 492. 



24 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

with ye Reverend ministers where to go for a minister, and 
empowered them to go or send for a minister at the cost of 
the Society." 

They soon found Mr. William Graylord, a graduate of Yale 
College in 1730, a licentiate of Hartford North Association, 
who was born November 29th, 1709, the son of Dea. 
William and Hopey Butler Gaylord, of " the West Division," 
in Hartford, now known as West Hartford. Mr. Gaylord 
was the great-grandson of that Dea. William Gaylord who 
came from England to Dorchester, Mass , in 1631. The 
Church of which he was Deacon was organized in Plymouth, 
England, January, 1630; and after remaining five years at 
Dorchester, it removed to Windsor, Conn., with its pastor, 
Rev. Mr. Warham, in September, 1636.* The mother of 
Mr. Gaylord was the granddaughter, or probably the great- 
granddaughter, of Rev. Samuel Stone, who was minister of 
the first church in Hartford thirty years, for fourteen 
of which he was the colleague of Rev. Thomas Hooker, the 
first Pastor. Mr. Hooker died in 1647, and Mr. Stone re- 
mained sole Pastor sixteen years longer. Mr. Gaylord was 
received to the Church, in West Hartford, in 1729. After 
as appears, three weeks of trial, Monday, May 29th, 1732, 
the Society invited Mr. Gaylord " to tarry with us some 
considerable time." Having called Mr. Sturgeon with too 
little consideration, they would be more circumspect in 
choosing a second Pastor. On Friday of the same week, the 
Society voted to give Mr. Gaylord four pounds ten shillings 
for "preaching among us three Sabbaths." Three months 
later, August 29th, the Society voted to call Mr. Gaylord to 
settle in the work of the Gospel ministry. It was also 
agreed to buy the house and land of Mr. Sturgeon. Joseph 
Birchard, Captain Ketchum and Matthew St. John were 
appointed to carry out the vote. The Church was unan- 
imous in calling Mr. Gaylord. 

But there was apparently some difficulty in Mr. Gaylord's 
mind as to accepting the call. Possibly, the neglect to name 



* Dr. Hawes in Conn. Eccl. Col., page 86. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHUKCH. 25 

any salary embarrassed him. Six weeks later a new Com- 
mittee were appointed " to treat with Mr. Gay lord as to 
terms of settlement and salary." November 1st the call 
to settle is renewed by "a universal vote." Two weeks later 
the Society voted that the salary should be " four pence 
half penny upon the pound until four pence half penny 
makes one hundred and thirty pounds, to be paid, either in 
money or in provisions at the market price, and that to be 
a standing salary so long as he carries on the work of the 
ministry among us." Mr. Gaylord accepted the call, but did 
not accept the salary, and that was afterwards voted annually. 

In accordance with a custom of those days, which was 
not altogether abandoned till about fifty years ago, the So- 
ciety also voted, as a gift, or "settlement," as it was called, 
two hundred pounds. This was to enable a young minister 
to purchase a house, land, furniture, books, and wliatever else 
might be needed to set up housekeeping, and carry on his 
parish work, which it was hoped and expected would 
terminate only with his life. 

In Mr. Gaylord's case the Society afterwards voted to pre- 
sent him the house and land purchased of Mr. Sturgeon, in 
lieu of one hundred and sixty of the two hundred pounds 
promised. But since Mr. Sturgeon had left so soon, and his 
religious opinions, perhaps, were not all in harmony with the 
Westminster Catechism, or at least with the Saybrook Plat- 
form ; and inasmuch as the Society could ill afford to give a 
new minister a settlement every few years, it was consider- 
ately provided, "That if Mr. Gaylord turn from ye opinion 
or principles he now professes, contrary to ye mind of ye 
Society, then he is to return to ye Society ye two hundred 
pounds again." In December a salary " at the rate of sixty- 
five pounds for ye year was voted," Two years later, 1734, 
the salary was made for that year one hundred pounds, to be 
paid in money or provisions at the market price. 

The arrangements for the Pastor's support having been sat- 
isfactorily made, preparations for the Ordination were in oi'der. 
The Council met on the afternoon of the 13th of February, 
1733. The day was short. Some of the members had 



26 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

ridden, probably, oji horseback twenty miles. An evening 
session would not be convenient. An organization was 
effected by choosing for Moderator, Rev. Thomas Hawley, of 
Ridgefield, who was then in the twenty-first year of his 
pastorate ; and for Scribe, Rev. Samuel Cooke, who had been 
Pastor at Stratfield above seventeen years. On Wednesday 
morning, February 14th, the Council reassembled. We are 
interested to know their names. From Stratfield (now 
Bridgeport), with Mr. Cooke came Capt. David Sherman ; 
from Ridgefield, with Mr. Hawley. Dea. Thomas Smith ; 
from Norwalk, Rev. Moses Dickinson ; from Stratford, Rev. 
Hezekiah Grold and Mr. Ephraim Clark ; from Stamford, 
Rev. Ebenezer Wright and Lieut. Samuel Weed ; from 
Greenfield, Rev. John Goodsell and Mr. John Burr; and 
later in the day, from Greensfarms, Capt. Thomas Nash. 
The lay delegates in the minutes are styled Messengers. 

A careful examination of Mr. Gay lord followed, "as to his 
end in undertaking the ministry,'' and Ms doctrinal belief, his 
views of Church polity and his acceptance of the Confession of 
Faith. In these matters they received " good satisfaction. " 
To the Saybrook Platform Mr. Gaylord in substance assented. 
The order of Ordination exercises was as follows : Mr. Good- 
sell made the opening prayer; Mr. Hawley preached; Mr. 
Cooke offered the ordaining prayer ; Mr. Dickinson gave the 
charge ; Mr. Wright gave the Right Hand. We miss the 
"Address to the People," which was not then customary. 

Three weeks before the ordination, Mr. Gaylord was united 
in marriage with Elizabeth Davenport. She was the youngest 
daughter of the Rev. John Davenport, the fourth Pastor of 
the Church in Stamford, where he ministered nearly thirty- 
seven years, till his death in 1731. He was the only son of 
the only son of that famous Rev. John Davenport, who was 
the first Pastor of the first Church in New Haven, from 1639 
to 1667, and was one of the Synod which, by the order of 
the General Court of Connecticut, met in 1708 at Saybrook 
and constructed the Saybrook Platform, by which the ecclesi- 
astical affairs of the Congregational Churches, of this and some 
other Counties, are still regulated. Mr. Davenport was one 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 27 

of the most prominent and influential men in Connecticut in 
that generation. His death was spoken of as " the removal 
of one eminent for learning, and who was a bulwark and 
barrier upon our frontiers." 

Fourteen years after her marriage Mrs. Gay lord died, prob- 
ably from pulmonary consumption, leaving six children, and 
having buried one. Her husband's eulogy on the Church 
records is honorable to both. It begins thus : "A good God 
has made her a good wife to me, both in spirituals and 
temporals, prudent, faithful, loving, loyal, and very respect- 
ful." Her oldest son, William Gaylord, is said to have lived 
for a time in West Hartford, but is mentioned in his father's 
will as a resident of New Hartford. 

We are indebted to Mr. Gaylord for about thirty three 
years of well kept Church records, containing the names of 
the members of the Church, and the families of the congrega- 
tion with their children, at the time of his ordination ; the 
members of the Church in full and by the Half- Way Covenant ; 
a list of marriages, baptisms and deaths, with occasional 
remarks. 

From this record it appears that there were on the 14th of 
February, 1733, thirty-five men and forty-one women in full 
communion. How many of these were original members, 
how many had been added, how many dismissed and died 
during the six and a half preceding years, we have no means 
of knowing. It is worth noting that the thirty-five men, each 
had a wife, though in two cases the wife entered the Church 
after this date. The women, too, had each a husband. Of 
those who had owned the covenant, as their half way con- 
fession of faith was called, there were ten men and seven 
women. Of these ten, four of the men were without wives, or 
else their wives had refused to own the covenant. Each of 
the seven women had a husband ; but one of the husbands 
was alreadv in full communion, and his wife afterwards 
united. There are on the list thirty-two families, but not a 
widow or widower among them. There is some reason to 
believe that the list does not contain all the families in the 
parish. The name of Dea. James Trowbridge and of Dea. 



28 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

Matthew Gregory does not occur. Of the fiftj-one or fifty- 
two husbands and wives enrolled, only six or seven couple 
were neither of them connected with the Church. Of chil- 
dren whose names are given with their parents, there are one 
hundred and thirty-seven, of whom eighty-seven were bovs 
and fifty girls — a disproportion not too great to meet the sad 
waste of war in the fifty years that followed. The whole 
number of names exceeds two hundred. 

As families increased, new roads and bridges became ne- 
cessary. In 1735 it was voted to open a highway — where 
probably there had been only a cart-path — to Buckingham's 
Eidge — which has sometimes been called Harry's Ridge — 
east of Hurlbutt street. Four years later (December 14th, 
1739) the town is asked to build a horse-bridge across the 
Norwalk river, in Pimpewaug, near Capt. St. John's house, 
to repair the horse-bridge near John Marvin's dwelling- 
house in Kent, and to complete the bridge already begun by 
the Wilton people near the house of Eliakim Elmer on the 
Ridgefield road. The town votes to build the Pimpewaug 
and to repair the Kent bridge, but no action as to the other 
bridge implies, that we are permitted to complete it without 
town aid. Capt. Matthew St. John and Joseph Piatt are 
appointed a Committee to build the one and repair the other 
bridge. Five years later David Deforest was appointed in Mr- 
(now Captain) Piatt's place. The next year David Keeler is 
chosen in the room of Captain St. John, and the year follow- 
ing (1746) Benjamin Betts is chosen, in the room of David 
Keeler, " to take care of ye bridge at Wilton, near Lieut. 
John Marvin's dwelling-house." Bridge building that will 
endure the rage of the Norwalk river in Spring freshets was 
no child's play in those days. 

Soon after Mr. Gaylord's settlement a new difSculty arose. 
The parish grows. The minister is popular. The Meeting- 
House is too small, and not conveniently located. December 
25, 1736, it was voted to build a new Mecting-House forty- 
six feet long, thirty -five feet wide, with twenty feet posts, to 
be placed on what in the record is called " Sharp Hill," but 
which for above half a century has now been known as 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 29 

"the old burying-ground." A large oak yet marks the 
spot, sole survivor of the trees and shrubbery once there, and 
a silent sentinel over the graves of three generations. Mav 
no woodman's axe ever be lifted against it. The want of 
funds probably caused the delay to build at once. Novem- 
ber 18th, 1737, it was voted to build a house forty-eight by 
thirty-five feet and twenty-two feet posts ; and also to raise 
by taxes one hundred pounds for building purposes. Of the 
land needed for the site, John Marvin, Sr., gave eight rods 
square ; and seventeen years later (1755) Richard Dunning* 
sold above half an acre, for a burial place, for fifty pounds, 
old tenor. No plan of this house is known to exist, but the 
vote was that the front or broadside should face the south. 
In June, 1739, David Keeler was appointed auctioneer to sell 
the old house. David Keeler, Daniel Betts and Matthew 
Marvin were to receive one hundred and fifty pounds "to be 
improved towards walling and glazing the Meeting House and 
other things necessary." In December it was voted that the 
money for which the old Meeting-House sold should be paid 
to the same Committee, to aid in finishing the new house. 
But it is easier for us to vote money than to raise it ; for two 
years later (December, 1741) it is soon enough to vote " that 
in finishing their Meeting-House" they "will observe ye former 
model that the Prime Ancient Society of Norwalk hath 
done in finishing theirs," and " that the pews around the body 
of ye house be six feet square." It was not till 1743, that 
the seats were in readiness to receive persons, in the order 
designated by the Committee, and not till 1747 that the vote 
was passed, by which the galleries should be finished and be 
made of "good, white wood and white oak boards," "with 
one seat round the front," and "one tier of pews round the 
house." 

Meantime a wonderful revival of religion was going for- 
ward in New England and elsewhere, in which Wilton 
shared. This awakening began in Northampton, Mass., as 
early as 1679, and recurred on several occasions afterwards, 



* Richard Dunning is supposed to have lived in the house south of the burying- 
ground, now occupied by Charles Comstock. 



30 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

and especially in 1735, and again in 1740, under the ministry 
of Jonathan Edwards. Two years after the ordination of 
Mr. Gaylord special religious interest was manifest in Le- 
banon, in a part of the town which is now Columbia ; the 
Pastor of which, Eev. Eleazer Wheelock, who was in full 
sympathy with Mr. Edwards, distinguished himself greatly 
by the abundance of his labors and the power of his preach- 
ino- in Eastern Connecticut. Now, it happened that Mr. 
Wheelock — who was some two years younger than Mr. Gay- 
lord, and who became afterwards the founder and first 
President of Dartmouth College — married, in 1735, the widow 
Sarah Maltby, of New Haven, who was a daughter of Rev. 
John Davenport and a sister of Mrs. Gaylord.* It would be 
most natural that Dr. Wheelock's zeal and spiritual activity 
should be felt through his Brother Gaylord in Wilton. Mr. 
Whitfield, then on his second visit to this country, while 
going from New Haven to New York in the Autumn of 
1740, preached in the new unfinished Meeting-House in this 
place. The next two years a considerable number was added 
to the Church. 

But the revivals excited much bitterness and violent oppo- 
sition in many towns. Their promoters were, in derision, 
called the "New Lights." In some cases their conduct was 
not tempered with sound judgment. But the " Old Lights " 
were sometimes neither conciliatory or wise, so that in East- 
ern Connecticut several new Churches, known as " Separate 
Churches," were formed. The feeling of opposition to the 
revival, and especially to the evils which seemed to attend it, 
was so wide-spread and bitter, that in May, 1742, a law was 
passed forbidding, under heavy penalty, the minister of one 
parish to preach in another parish, except upon invitation of 
the minister thereof. The people of North Coventry had no 
Pastor, and had not yet organized a Church. Therefore, the 
Society voted that any one of twenty-four ministers named 
might, upon invitation, preach or exhort at any time in that 

♦Another sister, Abigail Davenport, married Rev. Stephen Williams, D.D., Pastor 
of the Church in Longmeadow, Mass., who was a son of that Rev. John Williams, 
of Deerfield, that was carried captive by the Indians, and was sixty-six years a 
minister. 



WILTON CONGREGA.TIONAL CHURCH. 81 

parish; and also "voted that any Church member, or any- 
head of family, may invite any of the above ministers to 
preach in said Society." 

But Rev. Dr. Pomroy, of Hebron — a near neighbor of Mr. 
Wheelock, an eloquent preacher and a man of much worth 
and weight of character — was prosecuted and fined, by the 
loss of his salary seven years, because he preached in a grove 
in Colchester, without the consent of the Pastor, Mr. Little, 
who did not belong to the " New Lights," but with whom he 
had always been on friendly terms. Indeed he supposed, 
until he reached Colchester on that occasion, that Mr. Little 
consented to his coming. The Wilton Church and its Pastor 
happily escaped these disturbances, and the Churches of this 
County were for the most part exempt from the strife, which 
the "Old Lights," who were afraid of revivals and especially 
of the fanaticism they occasionally excited, sometimes stirred 
up. The contention was really between a dead orthodoxy 
and the Spirit of the Lord ; and the Pastor of this Church 
and his people were blessed by yielding to the Spirit. 

But religious controversy was not the only occasion of 
trouble and sorrow to our fathers of that T3eriod. There was 
war, and there were rumors of war. In 1739, while this 
Society was building the second Meeting-House, the Colonies 
were involved in a war between Great Britain and her om 
enemies. Prance and Spain. A military expedition was sent 
to the West Indies. Six years later Connecticut and Massa- 
chusetts contributed largely of men and money, to an enter- 
prise which resulted in the capture, from the French, of Cape 
Breton and the strong fortress of Louisburg. This provoked 
France to equip, the next year, 1746, a powerful fleet, on 
which embarked many thousand troops, with the avowed 
design of burning and laying waste New England. Against 
such an armament the Colonies possessed no means of suc- 
cessful defence, and were in great alarm, especially in Eastern 
Massachusetts. They turned, therefore, to Almighty God for 
help. The answers to their prayers were most gracious. 
Storms, the sickness of the French troops, the suicide of the 
First Admiral and afterwards of the Second, delayed, scat- 



32 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

tered, and rendered impotent the fleet, so that it returned in 
ignominy to France, without having fired a gun against this 
people. The next year France sent another expedition, 
which was met and vanquished by an English fleet. But it 
was not till 1748, when Great Britain and France made peace 
at Aix-la-Chapelle, that the nine years of anxiety and loss 
ended. Even then heavy taxes remained, and a depreciated 
currency. Until 1740 the bills or currency of the Colony, 
known as "old tenor," were based upon taxes levied, and 
worth their face in specie. After 1740 the increase of bills 
to meet war expenses, without laying taxes sufficient to pay 
them, occasioned a serious depreciation. Eighty thousand 
pounds of Government "promises to pay," known as "new 
tenor," supplemented by no provision for paying, could no more 
then than now, supply the place of gold and silver. Mr. 
Gaylord's salary furnishes an illustration : The first year it 
was sixty-five pounds ; the second one hundred. In 1747 
and 1748 it was by vote four hundred pounds. In 1749 it 
was five hundred pounds ; the next two years six hundred 
and fifty pounds annually — that is, the currency had fallen 
to one-sixth or less of its nominal value. In 1761 Parlia- 
ment prohibited the Colonies from further issue of paper cur- 
rency, and gradually the bills were redeemed. In 1755 Mr. 
Gaylord's salary was only fifty-five pounds, and the next year 
sixty pounds, for silver was again the standard. The re- 
mainder of his ministry it ranged from fifty to seventy-five 
pounds. It needs no old journal, or letters from Pastor or 
people, to persuade us that this fluctuation of the currency 
caused much trouble and sufifering. The catalogue shows 
that the spiritual interests of the Church suffered. The num- 
ber of admissions to its communion was small during those 
years. 

Hardly had the financial skies cleared, when another and 
heavier storm of war burst upon the country, and raged for 
eight years, sweeping away thousands of precious lives and 
much treasure. This is known as the French and Indian 
war, which was occasioned by the plan of the French Govern- 
ment, to stretch a line of forts and trading posts, from Canada 



WILTON" CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 83 

to the mouth of the Mississippi. By this means, France de- 
signed to erect a barrier to the growth of the Colonies westward 
and southwestward, and secure for itself the Valley of the Miss- 
issippi and also the profitable trade with the Indians. 

But already the English looked with covetous eyes upon 
the territory west of the Alleghanies. The sword must de- 
cide who should possess it. 

In this war, Connecticut furnished a large number of men. 
Namely, one thousand in 1755, and twenty-five hundred the 
next year. The succeeding year fourteen hundred men were 
called for, and five thousand were raised ; and in 1758 five 
thousand, besides a thousand others sent to Western Massa- 
chusetts, as militia to guard the frontier. But now, seeing 
that Parliament did not, as was expected, furnish money to 
pay the troops, the taxes began to increase. The people 
of Connecticut had had enough of irredeemable paper 
money ; so, with each issue of bills, went out the law for tax- 
ation to meet them. In 1758 the tax was nine pence on the 
pound, and then five pence per pound additional, making 
a tax nearly equal to six cents on the dollar. The next year 
four thousand men were voted, and also a tax of ten pence on 
the pound to be paid four years later. The trial was the 
greater because for the first three years it seemed like wasting 
money and lives. The incompetence of the English adminis- 
tration, and of many of the English officers, who were selected 
on much the same principle that for some years men have 
been in this country appointed to office, occasioned disaster 
and humiliating defeats. But when, in 1758, William Pitt 
became Prime Minister and reformed the English military 
service, the tide changed. The enemy were driven from West- 
ern Pennsylvania and Northern New York ; from Quebec by 
Wolf in 1759, and from Canada in 1760 ; on which account 
we had in Connecticut a special Thanksgiving, October 23d, 
1760. 

But war-like operations and the call for troops continued 
two years longer, till terms of peace were signed in February, 
1763. Then for a time, except from Indian depredations in 
Northern New York and Western Pennsylvania, there is 



84 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

quiet in all our borders. The men who were active in that 
war were known to our grandfathers and great-grandfathers, but 
few of their names have been preserved on the Wilton records. 
The men who enlisted were, of course, credited to Norwalk. 
But aside from others, one death came sharply to Mr. Gaylord. 
Under date, October, 7, 1760, in the obituary list he writes : 
" Moses Oaylord^ aged twenty-one years," and adds : " He died 
at Fort Herkimer on his way from Oswego to Albany, after 
he had been from home in ye expedition against Montreal, a 
little more than four months, and after above two months of 
sore sickness at Oswego on his way toward Albany." There 
are four * others who died the same year, who were prob- 
ably soldiers, two of them at Schenectady, one of whom was 
Captain Thaddeus Mead. 

While his dear son Moses was dying at Fort Herkimer, 
the family of Mr. Gaylord were blessed by the birth of another 
son, who received the significant name " Deodate," " Gift 
of God," who passed his whole life in Wilton, and died in 
1840 at the age of eighty. Between the birth of the father 
and death of the son, one hundred and thirty years intervened. 
Mr. Deodate Gaylord is well remembered by many who are 
here. His daughter, Mrs. Charles Davenport, honored and be- 
loved, still has her home in Wilton, and in her son we joy- 
fully welcome the poet laureate of this Anniversary. 

In December, 1766, Mr. Gay lord's health was so much im- 
paired, that the Society voted to employ an assistant. But, 
as it would seem, before one could be obtained, disease made 
rapid progress, and he died January 2, 1767, aged fifty-seven 
years ; having been Pastor of the Church nearly thirty-four 
years. He was buried near the Church, where his memorial 
stone, bearing an honorable inscription, still stands. His Pas- 
torate was longer than any other in this Church, and, with two 
exceptions, double the length of any. He was the only Pas- 
tor, beside Mr. Ball, who has died in office, and the only Pastor 
whose dust hallows the burying-ground of this Society. 

Mr. Gaylord was evidently a man of public spirit, and 



* Abraham Higgins, 20 years ; Abijah Hubbell, 25 years ; Josiah Canfield. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 35 

held in high esteem by his brethren in the Ministry. He 
was methodical and exact in his mode ol life, as the Church 
records, now invaluable as an exponent of his Ministry, 
attest. Of the General Association, which yesterday closed 
its one hundred and sixty-seventh Anniversary, at Norwalk, 
he was six times a member, the first time at Hartford in 1740, 
the last at Lyme in 1763. In 1751, at Windham, he was 
Moderator. He was sound in faith, not a man of extreme 
views, and probably would be reckoned a moderate Calvinist. 
His epitaph gives him the honorable appellation of peace- 
maker. He was not remarkably demonstrative in his mode of 
speaking. A tradition, I know not how authentic, states, 
that when, on one occasion, he preached in Eidgefield, on ex- 
change with the Rev. Jonathan Ingersoll, the great grand- 
father of the present honored Governor of Connecticut, who 
was thirty-eight years pastor there, the people in Ridgefield 
spoke of the sermon as uninteresting. When opportunity 
offered, Mr. Ingersoll borrowed the sermon of Mr. Gaylord, 
and, without comment, preached it to his people. When the 
people praised it as superior to Mr. Gaylord's from the same 
text, Mr. Ingersoll replied, " he could always preach well, 
when he could get one of Mr. Gaylord's sermons to preach." 

The parish grew and prospered under Mr. Gaylord's minis- 
try, and was fairly united. The record shows above nine 
hundred baptisms (924 or more). Most of those baptized were 
}oung children, as the Half- Way Covenant prevailed, and 
most who statedly attended public worship brought their 
children for baptism. They were usually presented on the 
Sabbath, and sometimes on more than one Sunday of the 
same month. The record of deaths testifies to the general good 
health of the people. The average number recorded during the 
first twelve years of Mr. Gaylord's ministry was 4.5 per year, 
the next ten years 6.8. Among the deaths were the two 
eldest daughters of Mr. Gaylord. Their disease was con- 
sumption. 

There were on the list 183 weddings. The marriage fee 
ranged, as I read the record, from eighteen pence to forty shil- 
ings. Mr. Gaylord's second wife was Elizabeth Bishop. 



36 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

There were born to him thirteen children. Mrs. Gaylord sur- 
vived her husband forty-five years. 

After the death of Mr. Gaylord, the Society again applied 
to the Association. Mr. Samuel Mills preached as a candi- 
date. On the fifth of March, 1767, the Society voted to call 
Mr. Mills, fifteen in the negative. The first of July they 
again voted ; '' a great majority, only fourteen in the nega- 
tive," says the record. In October they repeated the call, 
" only fourteen in the negative." The Clerk of the Society 
evidently was not with the fourteen. Still Mr. Mills did not 
accept, and in February the Society made one effort more. 
They appointed a large Committee to wait upon Mr. Mills, and 
if he could not be obtained, to seek another candidate. Mr. 
Mills was evidently determined not to become the Pastor of a 
divided people, and so he finally declined. 

There lives in Wilton no tradition of this Mr. Mills, whence 
he came or whither he went, yet his excellence was so appa- 
rent, that the people would persist in calling him about once 
a quarter for a whole year. 

There seems no reason to doubt that this young man was 
the now famous Rev. SamuelJ. Mills, better known as "Father 
Mills of Torringford." He was born May 16th, 1743, gradua- 
ted at Yale College in 1764, was licensed by the Association 
of Litchfield County in 1766, and in September, 1768, was ex- 
amined and commended to the Church in Torringford, where 
he was settled in 1769, and remained the Minister of that 
Church sixty-four years, till his death forty-three years ago, at 
the age of ninety years. Six years ago that Church made 
a grand centennial celebration of the settlement of Father 
Mills,* who, though no longer m the flesh, walks in the spirit, 
not the streets of Torringford only, but the hills and valleys of 
Litchfield County, living in the traditions of ministers and 
people, and oiten heard at their meetings of Association and 
Conference. His mother, Jane Lewis Mills, was a native of 
Stratford. In his biography no mention is made of his preach- 
ing in Wilton. That year is unaccounted for. 

* The Historical Addrees was delivered by Rev. William H. Moore, and, with other 
proceedings of the occasion, published. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 37 

Mr. Mills was tall and large, dignified in manner, and rode 
on horseback like a general— the admiration of all horsemen.* 
His eyes were large and beaming, his voice rich and powerful. 
At times he was mighty in eloquence. He was frequently 
irresistably comic in his language and unexpected turns of 
thought; at other times he suddenly brought tears to eyes un- 
used to weep, or awed his hearers by sudden disclosures of the 
Majesty of the Most High, and of the awful solemnities of 
eternity. He has a special interest to us ; because his son, who 
bore his name, was associated with Gordon Hall and James 
Richards and others in praying and planning, at Williams 
College and at Andover, till the American Board began to be 
and to send the Gospel to the heathen ; and still further be- 
cause the present Pastor of this Church, named from the son, 
perpetuates and honors the name of Samuel J. Mills. 

In May, 1768, the Society invited Mr. Isaac Lewis to preach 
as a candidate. Mr. Lewisf was born in that part of Stratford, 
now Huntington, January 21 (0. S.), 1746. He graduated at 
Yale in 1765, in a class of which twenty-one out of forty-seven 
became Ministers of the Gospel. He studied Divinity at East 
Hampton, L. I., and was licensed to preach by Fairfield East 
Association, in Danbury, March, 1768. He soon received a 
call to Newport, R. I., to the Church over which the renowned 
Dr. Hopkins was subsequently settled. But the unanimous 
call of this Society, and probably of the Church, X given in 
May, to preach upon probation, was accepted. The nearness 
of Wilton to his iather's residence may have influenced his 
decision to remain in Connecticut. In July, the Society voted 
to call Mr. Isaac Lewis into the work of the Ministry. There 
was some difiiculty in fixing the salary. Eleven voted against 
the call, not from dislike to Mr. Lewis, but because they pre- 
ferred the old method of voting the salary year by year. " A 
stated salary" was not to their mind. One hundred and fifty 
pounds were voted as a settlement, and seventy pounds as 
the first year's salary. Lieutenant Nehcmiah Mead, Nathan 

* See Rev. Dr. McEwen's reminiscences. 

•t Sprague'8 Annals, Vol. 1, page 663. 

X The Society in its records seldom mentions tlie Churcli. 



38 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

Stuart and Ezra Gregory were appointed a Committee to 
make arrangements for the ordination, which occurred Tues- 
day, October, 26th, 1768. Rev. Jedediah Mills preached the 
sermon.* He had been Mr. Lewis' pastor and instructor in 
fitting for College; was settled at Huntington two years be- 
fore the organization of this Church, and continued there till 
his death in 1776. 

December, 1768, Mr. Lewis married Miss Hannah Beale, 
daughter of Matthew Beale, of New Preston — a lady well 
fitted for her new position. He occupied a house in Kent ; 
afterwards, and till his death, May 10th, 1845, occupied by 
Capt. Daniel Betts, which was pulled down a few years ago. 
It was the second house south of the junction of the Ridge- 
field and Danbury road, on the west side of the street. 

The records show that, notwithstanding tbe unsettled state 
of public affairs, Mr. Lewis' ministry was neither barren nor 
unfruitful. In 1773 his salary was increased to ninety 
pounds. A majority also voted to build a new house of 
worship. When Mr. Lewis was settled, the country already 
felt the ground-swell of the Revolution, and he shared with 
his people the anxiety and losses that came with the war. 
In 1776 he was appointed Chaplain of a Connecticut regi- 
ment, commanded by Col. Philip B. Bradley, which was 
stationed at Bergen, N. J. After seven months service, he 
was so severely attacked by a fever that his life was despaired 
of. Afterwards he received the appointment of Chaplain in 
the Continental army; but, as the Wilton people were unwil- 
Img to give him leave of absence, he did not accept it. 
When the British were about to land at Norwalk in 1779, he 
went at the head of a company of men to resist, and a cannon 



* On the Council were : Rev. Moses Dickinson, 1727-1778, Mr. Samuel Fitch, Nor- 
walk ; Rev. Noah Hobart 1733-73, Samuel Rowland, Fairfield ; Rev. Abraham Todd, 
Greenwich, 1734-1773, Second Church ; Rev. Jonathan Ingcrsoll 1740-1778; Deacon John 
Benedict, Ridgefield ; Rev. Robert Silliman, 1742-'71 (1) ; Theophlius Fitch, [New] 
Canaan. Rev. Moses Mather, 1744-1805 ; Jonathan Selleck, Darieu ; Rev. 
Samuel Sherwood, 1757-1783, Weston ; Rev. Seth Pomeroy, in 1758-1769, Greenfield ; Rev. 
William Tennent, colleague of Mr. Dickinson, 1765-1772 ; Rev. Ilezekiah Ripley, 1767- 
1821, Dea. Thomas Nash, Greensfarms ; Rev. Ebenezer Davenport, 1767-1773, Greenwich, 
First Church. 

(1) Dr. David Willard, the grandson of Mr. Silliman, was, from 1812 to his death in 1860, 
a resident of Wilton, and a practicing physician forty -five yearj; also a member of the. 
Church from 1822. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 39 

ball struck within three feet of him. After Norwalk was 
burned the people appointed a day of fasting and prayer, and 
as the old Pastor (Mr. Dickinson) had died the year before, 
Mr. Lewis preached to them in an unfinished house which 
had escaped the flames. 

At one time, that he might preach in destitute places, he 
exchanged with the minister in Dorset, Vermont, for several 
weeks, and visited places in that region during the week. 
Connecticut ministers, by appointment of General Association, 
did much missionary circuit preaching in Vermont before 
the formation of the Connecticut Missionary Society in 1798. 
Before his missionary work was quite complete, Mr. Lewis 
had nearly lost his life by the breaking of a blood-vessel. 
Happily, he reached home alive and recovered completely 
from the disease. He had a highly advantageous offer to go 
to South Carolina, but declined, as he said, because of his 
'•strong disapprobation of the system of slavery." 

Mr. Lewis, as well as the people, felt severely the derange- 
ment in the currency produced by the war. In 1777 his 
salary was made one hundred pounds, lawful money, one- 
half to be paid in provisions, the prices of which were 
fixed and low. For example : Wheat was to be seventy -five 
cents a bushel ; beef, two dollars and a half a hundred ; 
leather shoes, one dollar a pair. But the next year, while 
the salary was the same, wheat was one dollar and sixty-seven 
cents per bushel ; rye had increased twenty per cent. ; pork, 
twenty per cent. ; beef was to be two cents per pound in the 
autumn and three cents per pound in the winter. Four 
years later (1782) it was voted that the salary be one hundred 
pounds, lawful money, to be paid m silver or gold. Daring 
these later years the financial difficulties of the country were 
so great, that it became necessary for the towns to assume the 
support, at least in part, of their own soldiers in the Con- 
tinental army. Accounts kept by Abijah Betts — the ma- 
ternal grandfather of our honored townsman, Capt. Abijah 
Betts, now living in Kent — are in the possession of his 
family. These give the names of officers and soldiers who 



•iO ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

received provisions and articles of clothing by this agency.* 
Aside from other afflictions of the war, Wilton suffered 
from actual invasion when the Briiish passed through on the 
occasion of the burning of Danbury in April, 1777. On their 
return, hungry and weary with marching and fighting, they 
entered many houses for food. As they came down the 
Ridgefield road, they lired a ball into the house of Dea. 
Daniel Grregory, in which were his wife and children. The 
eldest, Abigail — afterwards the wife of Moses Grregory — when 
above eighty years of age, was accustomed to tell how an 
officer came in, with his sword drawn, attended by soldiers. 
He assured them of safety if they would furnish food. The 
British set fire to the house near the Episcopal Church, now 
occupied by Mr. Sherman Fitch ; but, before they were out 
of sight, a woman went with a pail of water from the next 
house north (which has lately fallen down, but was for many 
years occupied by Major Samuel Belden), and extinguished 
the flames. As people heard of the approach of the British 
they hastily removed their silver spoons and such valuable 
property as they could. From houses on the Belden's Hill 
road, furniture was carried to Huckleberry Hills, as it was 
supposed the British might take that street ; but learning, as 
it would seem, that soldiers were gathering at Norwalk, the 



* From these memoranda it appears that the following persons were in the army 
a part or the whole of the periods 1780-1783: Capt. Samuel Comstock (afterwards 
Major), Lieut. Samuel Deforest, Ensign (in 1782 Lieut.) Matthew Gregory, Seth 
Hubbeil, Samuel Nichols, Jesse Olmstead, Ambrose Barns, John Johnson, John 
■Williams, Jonathan Jackson, Elijah Betts; aud in 1782 Lieut. Salmon Hubbeil and 
Uriah Mead. Elijah Taylor is elsewhere mentioned as Ensign. (1) A warning is also 
found written and signed by Samuel Comstock, Captain Kinth (?) Regiment, calling 
his company together for inspection the 17th of October, 1776. Washington was at 
that time at White Plains, after the retreat from Long Island. He had called most of the 
Connecticut troops to his aid As Lieut. Gregory was in the action at White Plains 
the 28th of October, it is probable that Capt. Comstock marched thither with his 
company directly after the 17th. Major Comstock represented Norwalk in the L egis 
latnre, October, 1800, and Wilton in eight Sessions, be,tween October, 1803, and May, 
1809. In his will he gave to the Church, for its Comriiunion service, a silver tankard 
which had for generations been an heirloom in the family. He was born 1739, the son 
of Dea. Nathan Comstock, and, as is supposed, in the house so long occupied by Edward 
Comstock. He died December 1st, 1824, in his 86th year. He enlisted July 10th, 1775. 
and was commissioned Captain, July 10th, 177(5. He and his company shared in the 
sufferings of Valley Forge, in the battle of Monmouth, aud the capture of Cornwallis. 
His wife was Mercy Mead, daughter of Theophilus Mead. Lieut. Matthew Gregory, 
the son of Ezra and grandson of Dea. Matthew Gregory, was with Major Comstock 
in the places just mentioned, and was also in the fight at Ridgefield, April 27th, 1777. 
His death occurred in his ninety-first year, June 4th, 1848, at Albany, N. Y., where he 
had resided forty years or more. His first wife, Mary, daughter of Hezekiah Deforest, 
died in 1796. 



(l)In records In Comptroller's Office, Hartford, says Hon. WUllam Edgar Raymond, to whom I am 
indebted for facta respecting Major Comstock. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 41 

enemy took the Westport road, and, finding Westport already 
occupied by several hundred Americans, they turned east, 
crossed the Saugatuck river about three miles above the 
bridge, marched to Compo, and got on shipboard that night. 
It was their last attempt to go far from the shore in Con- 
necticut. But the Wilton people suffered afterwards in the 
burning of Norwalk, though their houses and their lives 
were spared. 

After the war ended, a new difficulty arose. The " Half- 
Way Covenant," as it was called, had in the preceding 
century been adopted by many Churches in Connecticut and 
Massachusetts. The principle of this covenant, briefly stated, 
was that those who had been baptized in infancy, when 
grown to riper years, if " they understand the ground of 
religion, and are not scandalous, and solemnly own their 
covenant with the Church (into which covenant baptism 
introduced them)," "might dedicate their children to the 
Lord in baptism." And this, though they did not believe 
themselves converted persons, and did not propose to come 
to the Lord's table ! This theory was not at first generally 
acceptable to the New England Churches. In order to give 
it currency it was found necessary to convene a Synod at 
Boston in 1662, which, by a majority vote, recommended it. 
Many Churches accepted it with great reluctance, and some 
refused altogether. President Edwards showed that it was 
unscriptural. The revivals of that generation, by making 
the distinction between converted and unconverted men 
more manifest, prepared the churches to reject it on two 
grounds: first, that that covenant was contrary to theGrospel; 
and second, that trouble had arisen by the influence of uncon- 
verted men thus openly recognized as Church members. Mr. 
Lewis persuaded this Church to consider the question of 
giving up the Half-Way Covenant. 

A meeting was held October 30th, 1783, and continued by 
successive adjournments to the 4th of December of the 
same year, when, after much discussion, it was voted (1.) 
unanimously that, in the opinion of this Church, no person 
ought to be admitted to the enjoyment of the special 



42 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

ordinances of the Gospel ; but such as appear to be real 
Christians. (2.) The Church consents to abolish or discontinue 
what is commonly called the half way practice. (3.) The 
Church will not treat those in the Half- Way Covenant as 
outcasts, but is ready to receive them to Communion when 
they request, providing their conduct is good. The second 
and third votes were not unanimous. It is easy to see that 
worldly men — who enjoyed most of the privileges, without the 
responsibilities, of Church membership — would not regard 
with pleasure this movement, which left them without even a 
name to live ; but they were members of the Society, and, 
though Mr. Lewis seems to have been popular before, they 
" testified their dissatisfaction by withholding from him, 
either altogether or in a great measure, the salary they had 
pledged him."* Possibly, had the discussion of the subject 
not occurred till after the annual meeting of the Society the 
result might have been somewhat different. After three 
years the Consociation was called to hear the case, and Mr. 
Lewis, at his own request, was dismissed June 1st, 1786. His 
ministry lasted about eighteen years, during which three 
hundred and eighty-two persons were baptized; fifty -nine re- 
newed the covenant, and sixty-four were received to Com- 
munion. When the condition of the country and the 
experience of many other Churches during that period are 
considered, it will be seen that his ministry was more than 
usually successful. f It is evident that the Consociation so 
judged, for on the day of his dismission he was invited to 
preach in Greenwich. Some of the Wilton people were 
desirous that he should still be their Pastor, but in the 
October following he was installed as Pastor of the Second 
Church in Greenwich, where he remained thirty -two years, 
till, in the seventy-third year of his age and the fifty-first of 
his ministry, by his own urgent request, the Consociation was 
called. He was dismissed December 1st, 1818, and the same 
day his son, the Kev. Isaac Lewis, Junior, who had been 

* Many families, no doubt, voluntarily continued to pay tlieir proportion of the sal- 
ary, and he was accustomed to fit young men for College. Dea. Matthew Marvin 
fitted with him. 

t Sprague's Annals. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 43 

preaching at New Rochelle, was installed his successor, where he 
conti nued ten years. Mr. Lewis (the father) received the degree 
of Doctor of Divinity from Yale College in 1792. After his 
dismission he remained in Greenwich till his death, August 
27th, 1840. He was for a year or two a member of the Cor- 
poration of the College. He died in the ninety-fourth year 
of his age and the seventy-third year of his ministry. In 1830, 
when Rev. Joel Mann was settled at Greenwich, Dr. Lewis 
gave the charge to the people, which was his last public 
service, except occasional addresses at the Communion table. 
The sermon at his funeral was preached by the Pastor of the 
Church, Rev. Noah Coe, from 1 Cor. 3:11; the same text from 
"which Mr. Whitfield preached the sermon in Yale College 
Chapel, which had been the means of awakening his mind to^ 
religion more than three-quarters of a century before." 

To Dr. Lewis were born nine children, six of whom were 
sons. Two of the sons (Zechariah and Isaac) were twins^ 
born in Wilton, January 1st, 1773. They, as also a brother^ 
graduated at Yale College.* Mrs. Lewis died April 13th,. 
1829. 

Rev. Nathaniel Hewitt, once so well known here as the 
first Pastor of the Second Church in Bridgeport, thus de- 
scribes Dr. Lewis' appearance in 1818, the year of his dis- 
mission from Greenwich : "In January, 1818, I was installed 
at Fairfield, where I met, for the first time, the late Rev. Dr. 
Isaac Lewis. He took part in the public solemnities on that 
occasion, and offered the installing prayer.* * * In his per- 
son and deportment he united the Patriarch, Prophet and 
Saint. His head and shoulders were above his brethren, and 
his hair flowing and white as the snow ; his shoulders, broad ; 
his forehead, massive ; his complexion, so clear and pure as 
to resemble a child's ; a large, blue eye, expressive of mild- 
ness and purity; his voice, smooth and guttural; and his 



* Zechariah Lewis studied theology, hut was unable to preach on account of his 
health. He was Tutor in Yale (1796-1799), Editor, Secretary of the New York Religious 
Tract Society, &c., and died in Brooklyn, N. Y., November 14th, 1840, aged sixty-seven 
years. Isaac Lewis, Jr.. studied theology in New Haven, was ordained May 30. 1798, 
preached in Cooperstown and Goshen, N. Y., at Bristol, R. I., at New Rochelle, and in 
Greenwich, 1818 to 1828. He received D. D. from Delaware College in 1844. He died 
in New York, September 23d. 1854, aged eightt-one years. One of the sons died in 
infancy ; the other three were lawyers.— Sprague, Vol. 1, pp. 666-67. 



44 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

air and attitude, in the pulpit and in prayer, more as a 
man of God than any other I have ever known." 

A little more than two months after the dismission of Mr. 
Lewis from this Church, after a warm discussion, the Church 
voted, August 9th, 1786, to revoke their vote to abolish the 
Half-Way Covenant, and September 28th, 1786, to restore 
the Half- Way Covenant, according to the vote of 1770 ; but 
a few years after the Churches had, by common consent, given 
up that plan, and this Church, under the lead of Mr. Fisher, 
among them. The result of the course of the majority of the 
Society, in securing the dismission of Mr. Lewis, illustrates 
that societies and individuals often have it in their power to 
do things it were unwise to do. Several years elapsed before 
the Church could agree upon a minister, who would accept 
their call.* The salary was small, money was hard to get, 
and what was more to be deplored, there was a lack of har- 
mony. 

But the need of a new house of worship, and in another 
location, was now urgent. It was diflftcult to agree upon a 
site. There is a tradition that at one time it was voted to 
build upon the plain a little south of the present Post-Office, 
and that "the people in Kent, who would not go furti.er 
north, consented to go thus far from the old Meeting-House ; 
but at a subsequent meeting it was voted to build where the 
house now stands." It was a bold step to remove so far. 
There was then no other Church in what is now the town of 
Wilton. Had the new house been placed south of the Post- 
Office, and the road opened which now crosses the river near 
the railroad station, it is quite possible that the ecclesiastical 
history of Wilton for the last seventy-five years had been in 
some respects different. 

Timber, so far as it could be useful, was taken from the 



* April 2d, 1789, voted to call Mr. Calvin White— yeas, 14 ; nays, 2. May 21st, 1792, 
voted to call Mr. James Glassbrook to the work of the Ministry. Mr. Glassbrook 
preached about a year at Salisbury, and died October, 1793. April 29th, 1793, voted to 
call Mr. Methusaleh Bolding; 2 nays. In 1793, Rev. James Richards— a native of New 
Canaan, and afterwards for many years a honored Professor in the Seminary at 
Auburn— supplied the pulpit several Sabbaths. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 45 

old house to build the new,* which was erected A.D. 1790. 
The pulpit and seats of the old house were transferred to the 
new, and were used thirteen years, when new ones were sub- 
stituted, which remained till 1844. The older persons present 
remember those seats : square pews under each gallery and 
one between the north corner pews, and the "great pew" 
which surrounded the pulpit as a court, and was the successor 
of the old times "deacons' seat." It was entered by two 
doors, between which, directly in front of the pulpit, was a 
shelf or narrow table that was transformed into the Com- 
munion-table by raising a leaf attached by hinges to the 
inner edge. This, when in position, was supported by an 
iron rod. The table and leaf were stained to imitate mahog- 
any. The slips in the body of the house had a door at each 
end, as there were three aisles. The ceiling was arched. 
The galleries on each side, supported by four large pillars,. 
were high, as was also the pulpit, which had its lofty, conical,, 
but well-proportioned and ornamented sounding-board, firmly 
supported by two pillars that rose from the rear of the pulpit- 
The box of the pulpit was reached by a flight of stairs with 
balusters on either side, but when reached could with diffi- 
culty accommodate two persons. 

The pew of the Pastor adjoined the great pew on the east 
side. Consequently, his family were under the constant in- 
spection of the congregation. It might have been irksome to 
some of his children, but I do not remember that any person 
ever complained that they were not patterns of good behavior 
to other young people, f 

This building was formally dedicated to Almighty God, in 
December, 1790. The sermon was preached, as is well re- 
membered, though those who heard it have probably all de- 
parted this life, by Eev. Timothy D wight, D. D., the al- 



* The stones and underpinning of the old house were devoted to fencing the burying- 
ground where it stood. The vote to build was passed December 28th, 1789. The 
dimensions are fifty-four feet in length, forty feet in breadth, posts twenty-four feet 
in height. 

+ Outside, high up on the north side of the house, was painted on the siding what 
seemed, to near-sighted persons, a large window; but whose chief value to some irrever- 
ent boys on a week day was as a target for stones. They evidently did not apprehend, 
the architectural fitness of the thing, and felt for it a boy's natural antipathy to shams. 



46 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

ready distinguished Pastor of the Church on Greenfield Hill, 
and forever illustrious as the President of Yale College for 
nearly twenty-two years, from 1795 to 1817. His text was 
Genesis, 28 : 17, " How dreadful is this place ! This is none 
other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven." 
Dr. Dwight's commendation of the house is remembered to 
this day. 

Nearly three years afterwards, November 18, 1793, the 
Society, by a unanimous vote, invited to the pastorate Mr. 
Aaron Woodward, at " a yearly salary of £100 lawful 
money, twenty cords of good wood, and the use of £150 until 
a parsonage shall be purchased." The experience of fixing 
the salary every year, at the end of the year, had not been pleas- 
ing. Mr. Woodward accepted the call, and was ordained Pas- 
tor the 8th of January, 1794. The ordination sermon was 
preached from Acts 26 : 18, by Rev. Benjamin Trumbull, 
D. D., Pastor in North Haven sixty years, from 1760 to 1820, 
and distinguished as the author of a valuable History of Con- 
necticut.* 

Mr. Woodward was born at North Coventry, Connecticut, 
October 14th, 1760, fitted for College with Rev. Nathan 
Williams, D. D., of Tolland, and Rev Charles Backus, D. D., of 
Somers, graduated at Yale, September, 1789 ; studied Divinity 
with Dr. Trumbull, was licensed to preach by North Haven 
West Association, May 25, 1790. Theological Seminaries 
with a three years' course did not exist. Mr. Woodward had 
received several invitations to settle before coming here. A 
little more than two weeks after his ordination he was mar- 
ried, January 24th, to Martha, eldest daughter of Dr. Trum- 
bull. He brought his bride to Wilton on horseback, the ap- 
proved method of travelling then, when one horse wagons and 
gigs were hardly known. For a time he lived in a part 
of Mr. Nathan Davenport's house, and afterwards built the 
one on the opposite side of the street, now owned by Mr. 



* other members of the Council were: Rev. Moses Mather, D. D., Thaddeus Bill, 
Middlesex (Darien); Rev. Hezekiah Ripley, Joseph Hyde, Greensfarms; Rev. Isaac Lewis, 
D.D., Dea. A. Mead, W. Greenwich; Rev. William Seward, Dea. I. Warren. Stanwich; 
Rev. Matthias Burnett, Dea. Thaddeus Betts, Norwalk ; Rev. Justus Mitchell, Dea. 
John Benedict (New) Canaan ; Rev. John Noyes, Weston ; John Taylor, Ridgebury ; 
Rev. Samuel Goodrich, Dea. Nathan Olnistead, Ridgefleld ; Rev. Daniel Smith, Dea. 
Silas Davenport, Stamford; Dea. Reuben Scofield, North Stamford. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 47 

William Sturges.* The record of baptisms shows three daugh- 
ters born to Mr. Woodward while he resided in Wilton • 
Martha Trumbull, baptized June 28th, 1795 ; Juha Ann' 
July, 1798 ; Jerusha, January. 1801. The catalogue shows 
that thirty-three, some of whom became very useful members,f 
were added to the Church, and one hundred and four baptized 
during the Ministry of Mr. Woodward. He probably left 
Wilton in the Spring of 1801. X His health was, as it proved, 
permanently impaired, so that he was never able to resume 
the pastoral office, which he greatly loved. He bought a farm 
on the high lands of Wilbraham, Mass.,§ was for many years 
a Deacon in the Congregational Church there, and honored 
as one of its most valuable members. He had a strong voice, 
was fluent and very animated in conversation, easy in manner 
but decided in opinion. Says a gentlemen who knew him, || 
" His many virtues, his sterling principles, his unswerving 
integrity, his devoted piety, are deeply engraven on ni}' 
memory." Mr. Woodward died February 25th, 1840. Mrs. 
Woodward survived till December 10, 1851. 

Rev. John J. Carle, a native of New Jersey, a graduate of 
Queen's, now Rutger's College, in 1789, who received the de- 
gree of A. M. from Princeton in 1792, was the next Pastor.^ 

March 12th, 1801, the Society invited him to preach longer. 
Some circumstances, precisely what, does not appear, occasioned 
Mr. Carle to preach, on the 6th of April, a sermon before Rev. 
Messrs. Justus Mitchell, of New Canaan, Samuel Goodrich, of 
Ridgefield, and John Noyes of Weston.** These Ministers 

* It used to be said that Mrs. Woodward's carpet was the first seen at Wilton, and was 
siofnificani of other things. 

t Among these may be mentioned Jonathan Middlebrook, afterwards Deacon, and 

a liberal donor to the fund. Nathan niibboll, father of Rev. Stephen and Dea. 

Wakeman Hubbell, and Moses Gregory, father of Dea. Giles Gregory, of Wilton, and 
Dea. Ira Gregory, of Norwalk. 

i As some compensation for his loss ingoing away, the Society voted, 27th Feb., 1800, 
his salary for the remainder of the year. When he ceased to supply the puipit does not 
appear ; possibly in the Winter of 1801. But the Consociation to dismiss him probably 
met in the Spring of 1800. 

^Letter of his daughter. Miss Jerusha Woodward, Wilbraham, Mass., under date of 
June 7th, 1876, from which much of the above is taken. 

S Benjamin C. Eastman, of New Haven. 

•[Was Joseph Carle, one of the petitioners for Wilton Parish in 1726, an ancestor of 
Rev. John J. Garle ? 

** Mr. Noyes was long known and loved in Wilton and elsewhere. He was a half 
brother of Prof. Benjamin Silliman, Sr., and died 1846. 



48 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

had been invited to hear him and advise with the Church and 
Society "respecting the propriety of giving Mr. Carle a call at 
the present time." Apparently these Ministers were not en- 
tirely satisfied, and yet not fully persuaded of Mr. Carle's un- 
fitness for the Pastorate. Their decision was sufficiently del- 
phic. They judged " it advisable for Mr. Carle and the Society 
to seek after further acquaintance." Thereupon the Society on 
the same day unanimously requested Mr. Carle " to preach 
longer," and three weeks later, with unanimity, called him- to the 
Pastorate. There is no allasion to the Church in these votes. 
Perhaps the true office of the Society as the Trustee of the 
property of the Church was not so well understood 
as now. The salary offered was three hundred dollars 
with the use of the land and buildings* owned by the 
Society. Mr. Carle was installed June 3d, 1801. Three 
years later he asked a dismission. There were reports 
respecting his habits of drinking, it is said, which led 
the Consociation to decline at that time to dismiss 
him. Thereupon he publicly demitted the office of the Min- 
istry, in the presence of the Council, giving emphasis to his 
declaration by pulling off his coat. The tradition is that he 
shortly returned to New Jersey, and died early, a victim of 
intemperance. But I have found no authentic record of his 
subsequent life.f 

During the Pastorate of Mr. Carle, the parish of Wilton 
was, A. D., 1802, incorporated by the Legislature into a town. 
On the first of July of that year, members of St. Paul's Parish in 
Norwalk, residing in Wilton, formed an Ecclesiastical Society 
for the Protestant Episcopal Church known as St. Matthew's.:}: 

* Those purchased of Mr. Woodward. 

t John H. Carle graduated at Rutger's in 1811, and preached at Marbletown, Hurley, 
Shokan, Mapletown, and Curry town, N. J. Was he the son of John J. Carle? 

X The meeting to organize this Society was, as the law direct' d, called by the civil 
authority, and held in the School-house at Pimpewau^. Samuel Belden was chosen 
Moderator, David Lambert, Clerk, Daniel Church and Samuel Belden, Wardens. A 
House of Worship was erected (38 feet by 28 feet), in 1803, completed in 1818, and con- 
secrated by liishop Hobart. About sixteen years after, wings were added. A few years 
since the present building of stone was erected in its place. The ground for the Ceme- 
tery was the gift of John Jamec Lambert, A. D., 1815 Three Methodist Episcopal 
Churches have been built in Wilton, namely, at Bald Hill, Zion's Hill and Kent. Two 
others are near the borders of the town one in Poplar Plain, the other in Georgetown. 
A Protestant Methodist Church in Georgetown, organized about thirty-five years ago, 
became a Congregatio al Church, June 15, 1875. It has nearly ninety members. Albert 
H. Thompson is its Minister. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 49 

It is worthy of note in this connection as illustrating the 
liberality of the Congregationalists towards other denomina- 
tions, that in 1758, James Triiesdale was, by vote, " ex- 
cused from paying a rate to the minister in case he get a 
certificate from the Baptist Society." In January, 1764, it was 
voted to abate the minister's rate to Mr. Whelpley "so long as 
he attends the Baptist meeting and no longer." In 1772 this 
Ecclesiastical Society began yearly to appoint a Special Col- 
lector * to take the Minister's rate from those living in the 
bounds of this Society, who belonged to St. Paul's Parish, and 
pay it to the Rector thereof, in the same manner as the others 
collected and paid over to their own Pastor the rates of other in- 
habitants. How rigidly the tax was collected may be inferred 
from one example. December 1st, 1780, Clapp Raymond, 
Justice of the Peace, notifies Abijah Betts that he is appointed 
Collector of the Society tax for the support of the Ministry, 
or, in default of payment, to levy on the goods of the delin- 
quents, or in default of goods, to take their bodies to the 
jail in New Haven. 

The next Pastor was Samuel Fisher. Mr. Fisher was 
born in Sunderland, Mass., the 3d of June, 1777. Three 
months before his birth, his father, who was an officer in the 
Continental army, had died at Morristown, New Jersey, 
where the main body of the army were in winter quarters. 
He graduated A. D., 1799, with the fifth class that completed 
its studies at Williams College. 

He studied for the ministry with Rev. Dr. Hyde of 
Lee, Massachusetts, and before accepting a call to this Church, 
was ordained an Evangelist in October, A. D., 1805. Two 
months later, December 3d, 1805, he was installed as Pastor 
of the Church. In this office he enjoyed the lasting respect 
and esteem of many. His dismission occurred July 5th, 
1809, that he might accept a call to Morristown, New 
Jersey,f where he was installed on the 9th of August follow- 
ing. Five vears later he was called to the Presbyterian 



* In various years Samuel Belden, David Lambert, Jr., Joseph P. Fitch and David 
Huributt, were thus appointed. 

t His predecessor at Morristown was the Rev. James Richards, D. D., already men- 
tioiied, who was that year called to Newark, N. J. 



50 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

Church, in Patterson, where he labored twenty years. From 
that time his ministry was in different Churches, as Evangel- 
ist, or acting-Pastor. For five or six years he preached in 
Greenbush, opposite Albany. In 1837 he was chosen Mod- 
erator of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, 
New School. Ten years before, in 1827, he received the de- 
gree of D. D., from Princeton College. One of the letters in 
Sprague's Annals was written by him, and gives a pleasant im- 
pression of his style of thought and expression. For a number 
of his later years he resided in Albany, in the family of his son, 
B,ev. Samuel W. Fisher, D. D., who was born after the ftither 
left Wilton, became President of Hamilton College, and died 
a few years since. His own death occurred ■ at Suckasunny, 
Morris County, New Jersey, the 27th of December, 1856, when 
he was in his eightieth year. Mr. Fisher's Ministry was valu- 
able to the congregation. The evil effects of restoring the Half- 
Way Covenant, which for twenty years seem to have lingered 
in the Church, were partially tided over soon after his installa- 
tion, by the adoption of the present Confession of Faith and Cov- 
enant. The seventy-three Communicants which he found were 
increased by forty-three during the less than five years of his 
Pastorate. In the year 1808, the last fall year of his stay, 
twenty-six united with the Church. Possibly he would have 
remained longer as Pastor, except for the coldness produced 
towards him in some minds on account of his influence in se- 
curing the giving up of the Half- Way Covenant. But the in- 
terests of the kingdom of Christ and the spiritual blessings, 
which, in the next twenty-five years, increased the Church two 
or three fold, is a sufficient justification of the wisdom of his 
course. 

The next year after the dismission of Mr. Fisher, October 
17th, 1810, Eev. Sylvanus Haight was installed. Mr. 
Haight ^as born at Fishkill, New York, July 22d, 1776, 
almost one hundred years ago. He entered Union College, 
Oct. 7, 1797, in the class of 1801, and remained till the 
Spring of 1800. There he distinguished himself as a speaker. 
He preached as an evangelist in several places in the State of 
New York, and came here from Gal way, Saratoga County, 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 51 

where his ministrations had been especially blessed. He en- 
tered most heartily into his work here, and for several reasons 
that period in which he was Pastor, was memorable in the 
history of the Church. The era of revivals had fairly begun. 
This Church, especially for the first thirteen years of Mr. 
Haight's pastorate, profited by them. In 1816 and again in 
1822 a large number was added to the Church. About one 
hundred and sixty were received to the Church during his 
pastorate of nearly twenty-one years. 

The salary paid by the Society had always been small, and 
as the tide of emigration had fairly begun to flow, was not 
likely to be larger. Other Churches were raising funds ; the 
better to secure themselves against the evils of poverty, and 
against the mischief which was threatened, when the salary 
must be raised by other means than taxation. It was resolved 
to make the attempt here. Matthew Marvin, Esq., and Mr. 
Haight were the leaders in the work. The subscription was 
commenced January 1st, 1813, the condition being that un- 
less four thousand dollars were pledged, no subscriber should 
be bound. After no little effort it lacked sixteen dollars of 
the required sum. Mr. Haight who had already agreed to 
make an annual deduction of fifty dollars from his salary, 
subscribed the sixteen dollars in the name of a stranger.* 
Subsequently, Samuel Middlebrook and Jonathan Middle- 
brook, left each a legacy of five hundred dollars to remain on 
interest till the amount should be a thousand dollars. The 
two thousand thus secured were added to the fund increasing 
it to six thousand dollars. The payment of the several sub- 
scriptions to the Society was made sure by "Esquire Marvin," 
who advanced the money and received the notes of the sub- 
scribers payable to himself. From 1812 to his death in 1842, 
he was the Treasurer of the Society. Since that time his 
mantle has rested upon his son, Deacon Charles Marvin. f 
Before the settlement of Mr. Haight, the Society owned a par- 
sonage which was built by Mr. Woodward. Mr. Haight pre- 



* Prominent among the donors were, Matthew Marvin ($650), Samuel ComBtock and 
strong Comstock and Mary Betts, each $200. 

t Previous to 1790, for many years Abijah Betts was Treasurer, and from 1790 to 1812, 
Major Samuel Comstock. 



52 ANNIVERSAflY OF THE 

vailed upon the Society to sell, and paid twenty-seven hun- 
dred dollars for it, which sum was added to the fund. In 1832-3 
the present parsonage was built. The principal ot the fund 
has, in various ways increased, till, with the Parsonage prop- 
erty, it amounts to ten thousand dollars, which affords a rea- 
sonable assurance that this Church will not need aid from the 
Connecticut Home Missionary Society for a long time to 
come, and also binds those who enjoy these fruits of the self- 
sacrifice and wise forethought of the Christian men and women 
who have gone before us, to remember generously those church- 
es in this State and elsewhere that have fallen into poverty. 

Another important event of Mr. Haight's ministry was the 
opening of the Wilton Academy. Hawley Olmstead — a 
man worthy to be held in lasting remembrance — graduated at 
Yale College the foremost scholar of the Class of 1816.^ He 
designed to study law, but a failure of his eyes in college in- 
duced him to open a school as an experiment, Dartmouth 
College had its origin in a small school building yet standing 
in Columbia, Connecticut. The Wilton Academy was opened 
in 1816 in a small building, afterwards for many years used 
by the late Nathan Comstock as a store. It was soon seen 
that the young teacher had rare gifts for his office. Before 
entering College he had taught a district school and, as assist- 
ant pupil, had aided Rev. William Belden — himself a Wilton 
man — at that time Pastor in Greenfield and Principal of its 
Academy. An Academy building was erected in 1820. f 



* Hawley Olmstead, son of Aarou and Sarah Esther (Hawley) Olmstead, born Dec. 
17th, 1793, was descended on his father's side from Richard Olmstead, one of the first 
settlers of Norwalk, and its first Representative in the Polonial Legislature. His 
mother was a "great-granddaughter'' of Rev. Thomas Hawley, of Northampton, Mass., 
who was a graduate of Harvard College in 1709 and the first minister of Ridgefield, 
Conn. Mr. Olmstead married Miss Harriet Smith, of New Canaan, a niece of Rev. 
Daniel Smith, who was fifty-three years (1793-1846) Pastor of the First Church, Stam- 
ford. Mrs, Olmstead still resides in New Haven. 

t The land upon which the Academy was built was given " for the advancement of 
literature and science, and especially for the good will I have and bear to the Presby- 
terian Society of Wilton" by Nathan Comstock, to "David Willard, Samuel Comstock, 
2d, and Lewis Gregory— Committee of the Presbyterian Society of Wilton— for the 
time being, and to their successors in office forever." The land given was sixty-five 
feet front, and seventy deep. The land was to be used only for the erection of a build- 
ing or buildings for " a school of higher order, and for religious and singing meetings," 
" which school, kept in said house, is to be under the direction of the < lergyman of the 
Presbyterian Society, for the time being, and his successors in office, and the Preceptor 
of the school; and in case of the Society's being vacant or destitute of a Clergyman, t6 
be under the direction of the Committee of said Society." The date of the deed is 
March 25th, 1820. Mention is made that the school at that time was in Mr. Comstock's 
store. The witnesses are Sylvanus Haight and Matthew Marvin. The deed is acknowl- 
edged before Matthew Marvin, Justice of the Peace, and is evidently in his hand- 
writing. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 53 

It Stood south of the road, between the present site of the 
Town House and the Parsonage. About the year 1832 it 
was removed to a spot a little northeast of the present Chapel. 
The old building was sold, about 1870, to William A. Stur- 
ges, and stands near the Post-Office. Mr. Haight, with his 
usual enthusiasm, aided to publish the excellencies of the 
teacher and to procure pupils from abroad. The two first 
pupils fitted here for College — Nathaniel Bouton and Jared 
B. Waterbury — have long been among the most honored and 
useful ministers of their generation. Each received the 
degree of D.D. many years since. Dr. Bouton, for forty years 
Pastor of the Church in Concord, New Hampshire, is recog- 
nized as the Historian of that State. The school so prospered 
that after four and a half years Mr. Olmstead was persuaded 
to remove to Norwalk. His health became impaired, and 
three years later he returned to Wilton to rest and engage in 
agriculture. He also heard private pupils. At the end of 
two and a half years, in 1826, he again opened his school, at 
first in the Academy, and when the Town Hall was built, a 
few years after, in the upper room of that building. There 
he continued thirteen years, with no public examination, no 
private circulars, no advertisement, and yet uniformly a full 
attendance of pupils. When he left Wilton, in 1839, to be- 
come Rector of the Hopkins' Grammar School, in New Haven 
— an institution forty years older than the College — he had 
had pupils from nearly, or quite, every State in the Union, 
and from several foreign countries. Some of the Christian 
young men, whose names are yet held in loving remembrance 
here, had made themselves very useful in the Sabbath school 
and in social religious meetings.* 

After ten years of extraordinary success in the Grammar 
School, Mr. Olmstead's health failed and he relinquished the 
rectorship to his son, who had for two years been his assist- 
ant. For ten years longer he taught private pupils in his 
wn house. In 1862 he received from Yale the degree of 



* Among these Lockwood, David P. Judson, Stiles Hawley, James Smith, Nathaniel 
Wade, Willis Lord, E. B. Clark, Benjamin Smith, Ira Lawton, Edward Strong, Amos 
Cook, and Myron N. Morris. 



54: ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

LL.D. His death occurred the 3d of December, 1868, while 
he was addressing, in his own parlor, a club of ministers and 
laymen, with whom for more than twenty years he had met 
weekly to discuss some great moral and religious questions. 
Said an eye-witness: "He had just completed a most thor- 
ough, logical, and, as his companions felt, richly beautiful 
argument. It was, indeed, the beautful death of the Chris- 
tian soldier with his armor on, the disciple going out of the 
earthly service to the 'well done' of his Lord." 

In one of the later years of his life, anticipating some such 
day as this for Wilton, and thinking he might not be present, 
Mr, Olmstead charged me to give a sentiment, which will be 
recognized as characteristic of the man, and is fit to be 
engraven as his epitaph. It was this : " Unswerving^ supreme 
fidelity to Truth and Bight.''"^ 

Happily for Wilton the health of Mr. Edward Olmstead,. 
who was for two years the assistant and then the successor of 
his father in the Hopkins' Grammar School, became impaired 
after a few years, which eventually occasioned his return to 
Wilton in 1855 to resume the work of the Academy ; at first 
in the room vacated by Mr. Hawley Olmstead in 1839, and 
afterwards in a building of his own, where he continues to 
this day doing for the children what his honored father had 
done for their parents. 

One fact connected with the Academy ought to be- 
mentioned. Though it has done so much for Wilton, 
it has no funds, and beyond the room rent of the old 
Academy and the room over the Town Hall, has received 
no gratuitous pecuniary aid from the town, the Ecclesi- 
astical Society, or individuals. If some who have shared its 
advantages, with benevolent desire that others might receive 
like benefits, would provide a generous endowment, they 
might sow seed that would bear fruit of inestimable value 
when they have gone to their reward. 

* Mr. Olmstead was of med um height, stoutly built, very erect, and dignified in hi& 
carriage, but courteous and alfable in his address. He governed his school and won 
the lasting respect of his pupils in a remarkable degree with little apparent effort. His 
interest in Wilton was deep and constant to the day of his death. He was a member of 
the Legislature in 1825. '26. '28 and '29 and a fSenator from New Haven in 1853. As 
Chairman of the Committee on Education in 1826, and again in 1828, he presented 
reports on Common School Education that attracted much attention and exercised a. 
lasting influence. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 55 

When Mr. Haight was ordained there were few buildings 
of any kind near the Meeting-House, except the one nearest 
to it on the east, recently occupied by Mr, Moses Betts. There 
was no house on the road towards Kent till one reached that 
now occupied by Mr. John Betts near the river. The house 
of Dea. Daniel Gregory on the hill, west, now occupied by 
his grandson, William D. Gregory, was the only one near this 
house except the one across the bridge on the north, now the 
residence of Dea. Edward Olmstead. There was here no 
parsonage, no town house, conference room, or horse sheds. 
If in remote parts of the town dwellings have decreased, there 
has been growth in this neighborhood. The Academy and 
the opening of the railroad in 1852 have contributed to this. 

The great temperance revival of this century began while 
Mr. Haight was Pastor, and he threw himself into it early in 
his ministry with characteristic ardor. There has been a 
change in the drinking habits of the people which the young 
people can hardly realize. So late as 1829, the Temperance 
Reformation, which then only discarded distilled liquors, had 
gained such headway that one man determined, without the 
aid of alcoholic liquor, to raise his barn, which stands near 
here ; but so many men refused to complete the raising that 
he was obliged to send for strong drink. A few weeks later 
another man put up the frame of a barn in Kent, supplying 
nothing stronger than ale. This was said to be the first large 
building in town raised without the help of distilled liquor. 

The energy, zeal, and earnestness in the work of the minis- 
try wh'ch characterized Mr. Haight were remarkable. His 
sympathy with his friends in their affliction, and his readiness 
to make personal sacrifice for their advantage, were extra- 
ordinary. Perhaps a greater prudence in speech, when 
silence had been golden, had enabled him longer to escape 
some of the unfriendliness that clouded the later years of his 
ministry, and to the great sorrow of many who never cease to 
love him, and to his own great affliction, led to his dismission 
August 17th, 1831 . In the Spring of 1832, having sold his 
residence in Kent, since occupied by the family of Erastus 
Sturges, he removed to Pottsville, Pennsylvania, in which 



56 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

and in Norriton, Port Carbon, and other places, his ministry 
was highly successful. In 1846 he was, at the age of seventy 
years, installed Pastor at Bethel. Afterwards he resided in 
Wilton, supplying neighboring Churches for a longer or 
shorter period, where his ministrations were very acceptable. 
In 1849 he removed to South Norwalk, where he preached 
three years (1848-1851). As opportunity offered, he con- 
tinued his loved employment till within a few weeks of his 
death, which occurred April 6th, 1864, in the eighty-eighth 
year of his age. He was buried, at his own request, in 
Greensfarms, because he would be in death near his venerated 
friend, Kev. Hezekiah Eipley, D.D., who was fifty -four years 
Pastor of the Church in that place. 

Perhaps I cannot better conclude this sketch of Mr. Haight 
than by quoting from an article published after his decease* 
by the Secretary of the New York State Medical Society,! 
who was born and reared in Wilton. He says : " Mr. Haight 
was a man of quick impulses and ponderous energy. His 
will seemed to me inflexible, and he moved with impetuous 
force for its accomplishment. His person was massive, his 
head large, and his skin bronzed. When in after years I saw 
and heard Daniel Webster, I was greatly impressed with a 
similarity between them. Not that they were alike. Mr. 
Webster's movements were slow and majestic, but there was 
the massive body, the large head, and the bronzed face. 
Both were eloquent. Mr. Webster was calm, majestic, 
logical ; Mr. Haight bold, powerful, impassioned. He would 
have been a prominent man had he been thrown into po- 
litical life. His courage, his daring, his enterprise would 
have commended him to Napoleon as worthy of one of his 
Generals. 

"I remember the beautiful summer afternoon in August, 
1831, when a mere child, I went with my father to hear his 
farewell sermon. He was in the lofty pulpit of the old 
Church, which was very high and seemed to my childish 
eyes a great deal higher than it really was. In it his figure 

* "Norwalk Gazette," May 3d, 1864. 

+ Sylvester Willard, M.D., born June 19, 1825; died at Albany, April 2d, 1865. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 57 

rose majestically. His powerful voice was melted in tender- 
ness. The scenes of joy and sorrow through which he had 
passed with that people seemed to pass before him anew. 
When he concluded his sermon the people wept ; his heart 
was swollen with emotion, and his voice faltered, but with 
immense power and solemnity he concluded: 'Amen! and 
amen to this Bible,' at the same time laying his hand with 
heavy emphasis upon it. I was frightened, and thought the 
world was coming to an end. On my way home, I remem- 
ber, I asked my father if there were to be no more Sundays I 
He replied : ' Yes, but Mr. Haight was not to be our Minister 
any longer.'"* 

In December, 1831, Rev. Samuel Merwin — a native of Mil- 
ford, a graduate of Yale in 1802 — took a dismission from the 
North Church in New Haven, of which he had been Pastor 
nearly twenty-seven years, and to which, during his ministry, 
eight hundred and fifty persons were added. He accepted a 
call to this Church, and on the 23d of February, 1832 (ninety- 
nine years after the ordination of Mr. Gaylord), was installed 
its Pastor.f A few months after Mr. Merwin's settlement a 
deep religious interest was manifest, and Mr. Nettleton, who. 
for twenty-five years or more, had been distinguished as an 
Evangelist, aided him awhile. Several were added to the 
Church that year, and some each succeeding year, but most 
in 1836. The whole number received to the Church during 
Mr. Merwin's ministry was fifty. In a variety of ways his 
pastorate was valuable to the people. They needed to be 
especially instructed in the doctrines of the Bible. They 
were, unhappily, divided by the events of the few preceding 
years, and Mr. Merwin's large experience, eminent prudence, 

* Mr. Haight was twice married. The children of his first wife were Martha, Cla- 
rissa, Sylvanus, Frances and Henry — three daughters and two sons. Both the sons 
and the youngest daughter, as I remember, diea before their father. The second Mrs. 
Haight — formerly Mrs. Brush, a very estimable woman— died in Norwalk a few years 
since. 

t The members of the Councils which ordained Messrs. Carle, Fisher and Haight are 
not named on the Church record. At Mr. Merwin's installation there were present: 
Eev. Daniel Smith, Stamford ; Rev. Piatt Buffett, Dea. E. Close, Stanwich ; Rev. Joel 
Mann, Isaac Holley, West Greenwich; Rev. Henry Fuller, William Crissy, North 
Stamford ; Rev. Ebenezer Piatt, Joseph Mather, Darien ; Rev. John H. Hunter, Charles 
Bennett, Fairfield; Rev. Chauncey Wilcox, Dea. Obadiah Mead, North Greenwich; 
Rev. Nathaniel Hewitt, D.D., Jesse Sterling, Bridgeport; Rev. Charles G. Selleck, Dea. 
Harvey Smith, Ridgefleld; Dea. Seth Hickok, New Canaan ; Deacon Hyde, Greens- 
farms ; Benjamin Lyijes, Ridgebury ; Daniel K. Nash, Norwalk. 



58 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

and clearly arranged sermons tended to enlighten the con- 
science, to produce harmony, and to elevate the standard of 
religious life. And it might be added, if this were the two 
hundredth anniversary of the foundation of this Church, 
that his family — of which Mrs. Merwin was the pattern, and 
with her husband the head, bringing with them the culture 
of a lifetime in New Haven — exerted, unconsciously perhaps,, 
a refining and healthful influence upon many households. It 
is significant, that the first young lady to recite in Latin in the- 
Wilton Academy was a daughter of Mr. Merwin. 

The health of Mr. Merwin had been impaired by the 
amount of labor incident to the large numbers gathered into 
the New Haven Church during his ministry. As years went 
on it did not improve in Wilton, and he asked for a dis- 
mission. The Church at first opposed, but consented to call 
the Consociation, and the pastoral relation was dissolved the 
25th of September, 1838. Mr. Merwin removed to New 
Haven, and, though not again undertaking a pastoral charge,, 
was active in Christian work in various ways ; was helpful as 
a member of occasional Councils ; was often consulted in 
Ecclesiastical matters, and enjoyed in a high degree the 
respect and confidence of the Christian public. His pleasure 
in the study of the Word of God seemed to increase as the 
years went on. He was remarkably gifted in prayer, in 
which the words of the inspired writers were continually 
quoted with surprising facility and aptness. It was his joy 
in the declining years of his life " to visit the afflicted with 
Christian consolation, to pray by the bedside of the sick or 
dying, and to preach the Gospel to the poor." His custom 
on the Sabbath was to conduct a religious service in the 
Chapel of the Almshouse. 

On the 25th of February, 1855, he preached a semi- 
centennial sermon in the North Church, commemorative of 
his pastorate there and in Wilton. This (at the request of 
Governor Dutton, James Brewster and others) was published, 
and, happily, prefaced with an excellent likeness of Mr. 
Merwin. On the 22d of October the same year, Mr. and 
Mrs. Merwin and their two sons and five daughters, with their 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 59 

sons-in-law and daughters-in-law (six ministers in all and 
eight graduates, the family having lost none by death), cele- 
brated their golden wedding amid the congratulations of 
many friends. Before another year, on the 3d of September, 
1856, Mr. Merwin departed this life. 

In preaching at his funeral Dr. Bacon said :* " The close 
of his life was in perfect harmony with its course. Paralysis 
had impaired his physical strength, and to some extent the 
clearness of his memory and the activity of his mental 
powers, yet life had not become a burden ; and while he 
knew that death was at the door, and was in daily expecta- 
tion of tlie summons, he could enjoy, with a cheerful and 
grateful mind, the society and the assiduous attention of her 
with whom he had walked hand in hand for more than fifty 
years and of their children who gathered around him from 
their homes ; and when he lay upon the bed from which he 
was to rise no more, while all the delights of earth and time 
were failing, he delighted still in prayer. At my last visit to 
him we had kneeled at his bedside to pray, and when the 
words from my lips were ended, his own voice took up the 
strains of supplication, and in his own tones, and his own 
characteristic style of utterance, with no fault of memory or 
connection, and with no iteration of petitions already offered, 
he led us again to the Throne of Grace. Thus, calmly, 
meekly, patiently, devoutly, he died, as he had lived; know- 
ing in whom he had believed." f 

During Mr. Merwin's ministry here, a great tempest of 
controversy raged in Connecticut, and elsewhere, on questions 
of religious doctrine, in which some of the members of Fair- 
field West Association were deeply interested, and the 
Churches much divided. The East Windsor (now Hartford) 
Theological Institute grew out of that discussion. Happily, 
Mr. Merwin, while holding decidedly to the theology he had 
learned from Dwight and Edwards, and in full sympathy 



* Congregational Year Book, 1857, p. 119. 

+ Mr. Merwin was of medium stature and size, erect, active, and walked with elastic 
step. He had dark eyes, a benevolent countenance ; in conversation was grave or 
cheerful, as occasion served ; spoke with a deep, musical voice, and so well balanced 
was his judgment that he rarely gave utterance to words he would wish to recall. 



60 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

with New Haven Divinity, as it was called, continued to 
preach as he had been accustomed to do before, and this 
Church was not agitated by that storm. After the dis- 
mission of Mr. Merwin numerous candidates were heard, 
of whom Eev. Henry Benedict, formerly Pastor four years 
in Norwalk* and afterwards for twelve years acting- 
Pastor in Westport, received a call, which he declined. 

On the 22d of February, 1839, Rev. John Smith was in- 
stalled the ninth Pastor of this Church. Mr. Smith was a gradu- 
ate of Yale College in 1821. He was born in Wethersfield, Ct, 
September 2d, 1796, the son of James and Sarah (Hanmer) 
Smith. He studied theology two years at Andover, and one 
year at Princeton, was licensed to preach by Fairfield East Asso- 
ciation April 24th, 1824, and ordained Pastor of the Presbyte- 
rian Church in Trenton, New Jersey, on the 8th of March, 1826. 
This charge he resigned in August, 1828, and the 12th of 
March following (1829) was installed Pastor of the Congrega- 
tional Church in Exeter, New Hampshire. After a pastorate 
of about nine years he was dismissed February 14th, 1838. 
After spending a portion of the year as an agent of the 
American Tract Society, he was installed here the 22d of 
February, 1839. Three years later occurred one of the most 
remarkable revivals in the history of the Church, as a result 
of which the second Sabbath in May, 1842, ninety -five were 
added to the Church, ninety-three or four by profession, 
about half of whom were baptized at that time. Mr. Smith 
had some excellent gifts for pastoral work, in which he was 
untiring. He was interested in the schools, and a portion 
of the time School Visitor. His presence was understood to 
be welcome in neighboring Churches when he exchanged. 
Without being showy his sermons were sound in doctrine, 
and furnished food for profitable thought. He was a man of 
peace, and spiritually minded. His conduct and conversation 
tended to promote unity and brotherly love. Above one 
hundred and thirty were received to the Church during his 
ministry. 

* 1828-1832. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 61 

Next to the revival of 1842 the event of his ministry was 
the remodeling of the Church edifice. At its annual meet- 
ing, about the beginning of the year 18-14, the Society voted 
to remove the sounding-board from above the pulpit. Before 
the meeting adjourned, a member* who was expert in the 
use of tools had appointed himself a Committee, procured a 
saw, and carried the vote into execution. But now the 
crowning glory of the house was gone. The need of doing 
more was painfully apparent. A movement was soon made, 
in which the present Senior Deacon was foremost, to raise a 
fund, lower the galleries, reseat the house, build a new pulpit, 
and to make such other changes within and without as con- 
venience and taste required. Rarely has an undertaking to 
modernize an old house been more successful. While the 
work was in progress the usual Sabbath services were held 
in the Conference room. Most of those who were active in 
this work — men and women honored and beloved, and espe- 
cially dear to many who are here — sleep with their fathers, 
who built the house fifty-five years earlier. Others yet sur- 
vive to enjoy, with a younger generation, the fruit of their 
labors and gifts for the house of the Lord.f 

In 1848 Mr. Smith asked a dismission. Action in calling 
Consociation was delayed several months. He was dismissed 
in June. On the 26th of July, 1848, he was installed Pastor 
in Kingston, New Hampshire, where he remained till early 
in the year 1855. Removing to Stamford, Conn., he preached 
about two years (1856-1858) in Long Ridge and occasionally 
elsewhere. He continued to reside in Stamford with his sons 
— who were successful merchants in New York — till his 
death, from pneumonia, the 20th of February, 1874, in his 
seventy -eighth year. 

Mr. Smith was married September 11th, 1826, to Miss 
Esther Mary Woodruff, daughter of Hon. Dickinson Wood- 
ruff, of Trenton, N. J. About a year after his settlement 
here she suddenly died, leaving him with six children,:}: the 

* Mr. Henry G. Middlebrook. 

t A Fair was held to aid in procuring furniture. See Appendix. 

i Their names were Susan, James D., Charles, Esther, Walter, and Maria. 



62 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

youngest a daughter, whose eyes first opened to the light a 
few hours before. The grave of Mrs. Smith is with the 
mothers' and daughters' of this people; but that great sorrow 
cast a shadow over all his subsequent life in Wilton. In 
1843 he married Miss Louisa Gridley, of Middletown, now 
Cromwell, who died (without children) some time before her 
husband. 

When Mr. Smith was dismissed, there was in the Divinity 
School at New Haven, and in the College Faculty as Tutor, 
a young man, who had graduated five years before, at Yale, 
with the highest honor ; who was born in India, and bore the 
name of his father, who was one of those godly men that 
prayed at Williams for the heathen, and petitioned the Gen- 
eral Association of Massachusetts to aid the young men who 
desired to go and preach to the heathen, and who, when hav- 
ing reached Calcutta, and having been refused permission to 
stay in India, with his associates, so wisely and vigorously 
reasoned with the authorities, that, after a protracted and 
painful struggle, consent was obtained, and he remained a 
" wise, intrepid, patient, self-sacrificing missionary " till, in 
1826, while on a journey, having been attacked by the 
cholera, lying on the veranda of a heathen temple, Gordon 
Hall breathed out his life with the thrice repeated words : 
"Glory to Thee, O God." The son, with his mother, 
Mrs. Margaret (Lewis) Hall, reached this country a little be- 
fore his father's death. It happened that two of his College 
classmates* were natives of Wilton, one of whom was also a 
Tutor at that time. Mr. Hall, after preaching a few Sab- 
baths, received a call to the pastorate. October 10th he was 
married to Miss Emily, youngest daughter of Rev. Samuel 
Merwin, and on the 25th of October, 1848 — a little more than 
ten years after Mr. Merwin's dismission — Mr. Hall was or- 
dained Pastor. The pastorate continued till the 4th of May, 
1852, when he was dismissed, that he might accept a call to 
the Edwards Church, Northampton, Mass., over which he 
was installed a month later, the 2d of June, lb52. Mr. 
Hall's ministry in Wilton, though brief, was fruitful in addi- 



* Lewis R. Hurlbutt, M.D., of Stamford, and Charles Jones, Esq., of New York. 



WILTON CONGREGATIOXAL CHURCH. 63 

tions to the Church and in the quickened lives of Christians. 
Sixty-six were added to the communicants. The blessing 
that attended his labors equalled the hopes of his friends. 
Had the Committee of the Edwards Church, whose report oc- 
casioned his call thither, heard some of the comments on their 
proceedings, they might have accepted them as evidence of 
their sagacity in choosing for their Pastor one from whom his 
people would not willingly part. In 186-i Mr. Hall received 
D. D. from Amherst College. 

While all his predecessors in office in this Church, and his 
two immediate successors, are no longer on earth, happil}', 
Dr. Hall yet lives, honored and beloved. And we may hope 
that when this Church, in the first year of the next century, 
shall celebrate its one hundred and seventy-fifth anniversary, 
or the Town its Centennial in 1902, he may be permitted to 
honor the occasion with his presence, and receive the con- 
gratulations of those who are then here, that he has celebrated 
his golden wedding. 

It was the 6th of July, 1853, when the next Pastor, 
Thomas Scott Bradley, was ordained. Mr. Bradley was 
born at Lee, Mass., the eldest son of Eli Bradley,* April 
15th, 1825. His ancestors were God-fearing people, and he 
united with the Church, in Lee, at the age of sixteen. At 
twenty he entered Williams College, and graduated in 184-8, 
with an honorable stand. Three years later, in the Class 
of 1851, he graduated at Andover Semmary. Next, he 
spent six months with Rev. John Todd, D.D., in Pittsfield, 
Mass., in parish work. He preached meantime in Lanes- 
boro', Mass., and afterwards six months in Cornwall, Conn. 
Mr. Bradley was tall, strongly built, energetic, rapid in his 
movements, earnest in his convictions, and prudent in 
speech. He was a popular preacher, affable in conversation, 
and fond of practical matters; but the condition of his 
health did not encourage protracted application in the study, 
and, in 1857, he was dismissed at his own request, f For a 



* Durfee's Annals of Williams College, p. 171. 

* A sermon preached at the funeral of Mrs. Abby (Gregory) Willard, January, 1857, 
was published. 



64 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

time he taught, with marked ability, the High School in 
South Norwalk. Afterwards he became Pastor in New 
Lebanon, New York. In 1862 he accepted a commission 
of Captain in the Ninth Company of New York Sharp- 
shooters, in which, through his influence, many of his young- 
men enlisted. He was sent to Suffolk, "Virginia, and, in 
withstanding a siege and as skirmishers, the Company saw 
much hard service. Mr. Bradley's health failed from long 
exposure in the trenches, and he set out on a furlough for the 
North ; but at Philadelphia the typhoid fever prostrated him. 
He greatly desired to reach home and see his friends once 
more ; but that was not granted. He telegraphed for Mrs, 
Bradley, who came and did what she could, till on the 28th 
of June, 1863, at the age of thirty-eight, he died. His body 
was buried by the side of his father in Lee. 

Before coming to Wilton he married Miss Harriet L. 
Reed, of Milan, Ohio, where he had for some time taught 
a school. They had two children — Samuel R. Bradley and 
Hattie Bell Bradley — both living. Mrs. Bradley returned to 
her father's in Milan, and died with consumption. 

The successor of Mr. Bradley in Wilton was Charles 
Bassett Ball, who was ordained here the 20th of January, 
1858. Mr. Ball* was a townsman of Mr. Bradley, having 
been born in Lee, Mass., the 9th of July, 1825. He was the 
son of Isaac and Lydia Ball, and graduated at Williams in 
the Class of 1846. The condition o£ his health turned him 
from the ministry, and he taught for some time in the pleasant 
village of Southampton, L.' I. Then he studied law, and 
practiced some years in Springfield, Mass. The improvement 
in his health led him to turn again to his early thought of 
preaching the Gospel. He studied theology for awhile at 
East Windsor. His call to this Church was by no means 
unanimous, but his excellent spirit, his desire for the con- 
version of sinners, his skill in conversing with his parish- 
ioners, his open-hearted friendliness, and the manifest divine 
approval of his ministry, won the hearts of his people. The 



* Durfee's Anuals, p. 561. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 65 

year was highly prosperous. Thirty-one were added to the 
Church by profession. At his death, which occurred sud- 
denly, January 27th, 1859, in consequence of a malignant 
tumor near the lower jaw, there was universal lamentation. 
A delegation from the congregation carried his mortal re- 
mains to Lee for burial. He was in the thirty-fourth year of 
his age. 

Before coming to Wilton he married Miss Sarah Huntting, 
of Southampton, Long Island, who is now Mrs. William J. 
Bartlett, of Lee, Mass. He left a daughter, Hattie S., born 
January, 1859. 

In the October following Mr. Ball's decease, the Church 
called Rev. Samuel R Dimock, who was installed December 
7th, 18S9. Mr. Dimock was a native of Coventry, Tolland 
County, Ct., born May 28, 1822, nurtured in Mansfield, a 
graduate with honor of Yale in the Class of 1847, a teacher of 
a private school for several years in Manchester, Conn. His 
first settlement was at Valentia, Kinderhook, N. Y. He was 
dismissed from Wilton, June 8th, 1861, and installed over the 
South Church, Pittsfield, Mass., the 24th of September the 
same year. Three years after he accepted a call to Syracuse, 
where he was installed the 14th of September, 1864. Taking 
a dismission from Syracuse, October 13th, 1868, his next 
parish was in Quincy, Illinois, in which he remained about 
two years. Thence he removed to Nebraska ; first to Crete 
in 1871, then became Pastor in 1872 of the Church in Lin- 
coln, where he was succeeded last year by one of our own 
townsmen,* whom we would gladly have with us to-day. In 
1875 he became acting-Pastor of the Church in Central City, 
Colorado. 

In 1849 Mr. Dimock was married to Miss Louisa S. 
Dimock, who died at Manchester in 1855. In 1858 he mar- 
ried Miss Anna S. Husted. 

The successor of Mr. Dimock in the pastoral office here 
was the Rev. Wheelock Nye Harvey, of Massachusetts 
stock, a native of Jamestown, Chatauque County, N. Y, born 



* Rev. Lewis Gregory, Y. C, 1864, grandson of Moses, and son of Charles and Harriet 
(Clark) Gregory. 



66 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

April loth, 1825, the son of Charles R. and Olive (Willard- 
Harvey, a graduate of the New York University in 1844. 
Mr. Harvey studied divinity at the Union Theological 
Seminary, New York, was ordained Pastor at Bethel, Conn., 
May 18th, 1853, where he remained about five years. Octo- 
ber 24th, 1858, he began as Pastor elect to minister to the 
Second Church in Milford. He remained in that relation 
three years, when he received a call to Wilton, and was in- 
stalled January 1st, 1862. The records of the Church show 
that his ministry here was profitable. Forty-seven were 
added to the Church, thirty of whom came by profession. 

Mr. Harvey's health was so much impaired that, much to 
the regret of the Church, he felt the necessity of relief from 
pastoral labor. He was dismissed October 15th, 1867. He 
now resides in New York. A difficulty in hearing led him 
to relinquish the work of preaching, which he greatly loved, 
and go into business with his father.* 

He married Miss Margaret Lewis, daughter of Edward and 
Cynthia (Gildersleeve) Lewis, of Portland, Conn., a graduate 
of Mount Holycke Seminary. They have four children : 
Alice, Lewis, Hattie and Charlie. 

The fifteenth Pastor of this Church, Rev. Samuel J. M. 
Merwin, was a graduate of Yale in the Class of 1839, or- 
dained Pastor of the Church in Southport, December 18tli, 
1844, and was dismissed, at his own request. May 3d, 1859. 
After a season of rest he v/as installed over the Church at 
South Hadley Falls, Massachusetts, December 4th, 1860. 
The call to this Church, as successor to his father and brother, 
was accepted in 1868, and he was installed by the Consocia- 
tion the 26th of October the same year. Happily, Mr. Mer- 
win's ministry has not yet passed into history, and as the 
honored Pastor of the Church of which he was the foster son, 
with which he united by confession of faith above forty 
years ago, he has no need that another should speak for him 
to-day. 

Among the memorable things of the last eight years is the 



* A sermon preached by Mr. Harvey, on Thanksgiving Day, November, 1863, was 
published. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH, 67 

building of a new and commodious chapel, with conveniences 
for the work of the Ladies' Society attached ; also, the intro- 
duction of a large and excellent organ. These are pleasino- 
evidences that in material prosperity the Church and Society 
are not decaying, and that it is not altogether unmindful 
of the duties which its opportunities impose. 

There are many topics, and many persons, who, to-day, 
should be remembered by us, as reverent and dutiful children. 
There are many whose names even are forgotten, and of 
whose individual lives we are ignorant, who worthily contri- 
buted to build not the material houses of worship only, but 
the spiritual walls of this Church. Though we pass them in 
silence they may well have our honor and gratitude sharinc^ 
these with those we knew and loved, whom the time 
would fail to mention. Yet there are a few whom the Church 
honored by calling them to special service, which they render- 
ed with alacrity and fidelity. These are the men, who used 
the office of Deacon well. Of these we have the names of 
twenty-two, but unhappily, for the first hundred years and 
more, there is, with few exceptions, no record of their 
election, and rarely one of their death. Apparently they died 
in office, except perhaps two or three who removed from the 
place. 

The first three mentioned are Benjamin Hickok, Jonathan 
Elmer and Jam.es Trowbridge. These were probably original 
members of the Church, since they were a part of the Com- 
mittee appointed by the Society to make arrangements for 
the settlement of Mr. Sturgeon. 

Deacon Hickok is supposed to have left a son, Benjamin, 
who united with'the Church by the Half- Way Covenant, with 
his wife, March 27, 1763, who was the father of Esther, the 
wife of Dea. Daniel Gregory, and lived to an advanced age. 

The house of the son — perhaps of the father — stood near 
the spot occupied by the building now used for the Academy, 
and was torn down early in this century. " Benjamin Hic- 
kok, Esq.," who died the 17th of November, 1745, aged 59 
years, was probably the Deacon. 

Dea. Jonathan Elmer was chosen, before the Church had a 



68 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

Pastor, to read the Psalm. As few had Psalm Books, we 
may understand that he read only one or two lines at a time, 
so that all who could, might sing the words. This was called 
" lining " and sometimes " deaconing " the hymn. There was an 
Eliakim Elmer, who lived near the Bridge on the Ridgefield 
Road in 1738 ; but Deacon Elmer's name does not, I believe, 
occur after 174:6. Jonathan Elmer, probably a son of the Dea- 
con, united with the Church in June, 17'±2. 

Of Dea. James Troiubridge there is no information, and the 
name early disappears from the Church records. In New 
Canaan the name remains. 

Dea. Matthew Gregory, was born in 1680. The place of his 
birth is not known. Some of his grandchildren believed 
that he came from England. He is supposed to have been in 
Wilton as early as 1718.* He had two sons, Ezra and Mat- 
thew ; the latter known also as Ensign Matthew, who was the 
father of Dea. Daniel Gregory. He died in 1777, at the age 
of 97 years, the year following the death of his son Ezra. His 
wife Hannah had died ten years earlier. His son Matthew 
died October 30, 1756, aged 45 years, A well-worn path 
through the fields west of his house signified to his children 
his daily habit of secret communing with God. 

Dea. James Keeler is not identified, except Feb. 18, 1759, 
James Keeler and wife were received to the Church on the 
Half- Way Covenant. When they became communicants is not 
stated. 

Dea. James Ohnstead is believed t(3 have been the son of 
Samuel Olmstead. He had a son James who had a son Aaron, 
who was the father of Hawley Olmstead, LL.D. His name, 
with that of Mary his wife, occurs on the Church records as 
admitted by the Half-Way Covenant, Feb. 22, 1756. In 1776 
he is called Deacon Olmstead. On a stone of gray marble in 
the old burying-ground, we read that he died March 17, 1777, 
aged 68 years. 

Dea. Nathan Comstock is first mentioned as Deacon, Dec. 15, 



* His letter to the Church was brought from Norwalk, 1740. His house was a few rods 
north of that builded about 1740 for his son Ezra, iu which his grandson Moses lived, 
and his great-granddaughter, Miss Clara M. Gregory, now resides. 



WILTON" CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 69 

1766. Among those married by Mr. Gaylord, are (March 7, 
1738-9) Nathan Comstock and Bethiah Strong. In 1740, he 
united with the Church. Major Samuel Comstock and Strong 
Comstock, the father of Samuel, Edward, William and Nathan, 
were his children. His residence was probably the house in 
which his grandchildren, Edward and Polly Comstock, lived, 
a little west of the road from Belden's Hill to Ridgefield, near 
its junction with the Ridgefield road. 

Dea. Nathan Huhhell. — In May, 1747, there came by letter 
from Greenfield three men with their wives and the wife of a 
fourth, who was a son of one of the three. One of these 
Cuuples was Nathan Hubbell and Martha, his wife. Eight 
years later, December 2, 1755, Mrs. Hubbell, the wife of Na- 
than, died, aged 53 years ; and 1761, Feb. 6, Nathan Hubbell 
died, aged 61 years. Three years later, June 17, 1764, Capt. 
Nathan Hubbell was received to the Church. In the absence 
of evidence to the contrary, it is easy to believe that he was 
the son of the afore-mentioned Nathan Hubbell He became 
Deacon Hubbell, Aug. 28, 1786, and had a son who bore his 
name, who spent his life in Wilton, and died here February 
2, 1847, in h's eighty iourth year; leaving two sons, one of 
whom. Rev. Stephen Hubbell, was then nearly seventeen 
3'ears in the Ministry. The older son, Wakeman, was yet to be 
Deacon. Deacon Hubbell was evidently an active, reliable, 
influential man. But tradition has preserved little of his ser- 
vices. The house in which he, his children and theirs, lived 
in Pimpewaug, for above a hundred years, has just been sold. 

Some yet living remember Dea. Daniel Gregory, who was 
chosen Deacon, Oct. 7, 1794, and at once inducted into office. 
His relation to Dea. Matthew Gregory has already been men- 
tioned. He was the grandfather of William D. Gregory. In 
the place of an older one, he built the house on the hill west 
of this house of worship, in which the latter lives.* He died 
April 18, 1821, at the age of seventy-eight. He united with 
the Church August 5, 1764, so that he was a member fifty- 
seven years, and a Deacon twenty-seven. His wife, Esther 



* His children were Abigail, Elijah, Giles, Clark, Daniel and Sherman. 



70 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

Hickok, supposed to be the granddaughter of Dea. Benjamin 
Hickok, was a fitting helper in every good work, and died 
May 13, 1822, at the age of seventy-seven years. Deacon 
Gregory believed in covenant mercies, and a granddaughter 
gratefully remembered many years after, his frequent prayer 
for his " children and his children's children unto the third and 
fourth generation." He was a thrifty farmer, given to hospital- 
ity. 

Dea. Jesse St. John was a soldier of the Revolution, and a 
member of one of the two " forlorn hopes" of twenty men 
each, which volunteered to lead the attack in that desperate 
but brilliant surprise and capture of Stony Point, on the 
night of July 16th, 1779, by General Anthony Wayne. 
Deacon St. John was not tall, but strongly built, capable of 
enduring much fatigue ; a man of few words and resolute in 
purpose. As late as 1841 he would walk from his home, 
west of the lower part of Belden's Hill, two and a half miles, 
to attend a Preparatory lecture in a hot day in summer. 
Soon after that time he removed to Brooklyn, E. D. (N. Y.), 
to spend the remainder of his life with his son Thomas St. 
John. His death occurred about 1846. His wife was Anna 
Weed, to whom he was married Sept. 28, 1790. She died 
the 18th of March, 1829, aged 73 years. 

Dea. John Chapman was born in that part oi Fairfield 
which is now in Westport, in March, 1759. He married 
Susannah Fitch, daughter of James Fitch of Norwalk, and 
about 1790 removed to Chestnut Hill, where he lived in the 
house now occupied by his son-in-law, Mr. Asahel Dudley, till 
his death, April 13th, 1816. Mrs. Chapman was born Dec. 
24th, 1756, and died March 14, 1833. They had four chil- 
dren, Anna H. (Mrs. Dudley), James Fitch, John and Clark M. 
One who knew him well says : " Deacon Chapman was erect, six 
feet two inches in height, muscular and broad shouldered, of 
commanding presence, calm, even tempered but very resolute, 
energetic and industrious. Decided in his opinions, he was 
yet gentle in his family, who loved and venerated him. An 
excellent singer, he was regularly in his place in the choir on 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 7% 

Sunday. After a hard day's work he would go to Norwalk 
on business, and on his way home, forgetful of time, spend 
several hours at the house of some friend in singing. Fond 
of home, of a retiring disposition, he seldom took the 
lead unless evidently called by duty. His Christian char- 
acter was marked and consistent." 

His son, John Chapman, inherited his father's love for music, 
and led the choir fifty years ago. Both he and James R 
were much respected. They went into business in New York, 
and died there ; the latter, at the age of 55 years, Sept. 29, 
1847. Tradition says the house in which Deacon Chapman 
lived was built about 1745. It was used early in the Revolu- 
tion as a storehouse for some Norwalk goods. At the time 
of the burning of Danbury, a scouting party entered it and 
destroyed many of the goods. 

Dea. Matthew Marvin^ the sixth in descent from that 
Matthew Marvin who, coming to this country in 1685,* in 
the ship Increase^ Robert Lea, master, settled at Hartford ; 
the fifth in descent from that Matthew Marvin who, at the 
age of eight years, came with his father from England, and, 
at the age of twenty -four, came one of the first settlers to Nor- 
walk; was the son of that Matthew Marvin who, about 1760, 
came from Norwalk and built the house in Pimpewaug, in 
which the son Matthew was born and died, and in which 
Dea. Charles Marvin now lives. He fitted for College with 
his Pastor (Mr. Lewis), graduated at Yale in 1785, went into 
business at Hudson, N. Y., returned to Wilton at the death 
of his father (1791), and for twenty-five years engaged with 
remarkable success in mercantile affairs, and for the re- 
mainder of his life was active in public and especially in 
Church and Society matters ; the honored citizen, the trusted 
counsellor, the faithful deacon till his death, which occurred 
in the eighty-second year of his age,f on the 5th of June, 
1842 ; less than a month after the great ingathering following 
the revival of that year, into which he had entered with 
the activity of a younger man. Deacon Marvin or "Esquire 



* Dr. N. Bouton's Hist. Disc, at Norwalk, 1851, p. 71. 
t He was baptized January 11th, 1761. 



72 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

Marvin," as he was more frequently called, was tall, well 
proportioned, dignified and courteous in manner, active, clear- 
headed and resolute ; by natural gifts, by education, and by 
possession of property well fitted to exercise an extra- 
ordinary and salutary influence in the parish and town. 

Dea. Zadok Raymond, son of Clapp Eaymond, born about 
1764, united with the Church in 1811, and lived in Kent, in 
the house now for many years occupied by Charles Comstock ; 
but in his later life in the first house on the road leading to 
Hurlbutt street, formerly occupied by his brother, Asahel 
Eaymond, where he died April 12th, 1841, at the age of 
seventy -seven. He was a man, humble, devout and beloved, 
much interested in benevolent work. The Pastor of this 
Church may remember when, on a bright Summer's morning 
in 1832, two boys, who went on an errand to Deacon Ray- 
mond's, waited without, until he had ended worship in the 
family and with the men who had come to work in the hay- 
field. He evidently believed that the hired laborer might 
enjoy and be benefited by such service. He loved good men, 
and his house was often open for Sunday five o'clock and 
other neighborhood prayer-meetings. 

Dea. Jonathan Middlehrook was the son of Michael Middle- 
brook, who came to Wilton from Fairfield, and, by the Half- 
Way Covenant, united with the Church June 1st, 1766. 
Jonathan Middlebrook united with the Church during the 
ministry of Mr. Woodward. The date of his election to the 
office of Deacon is not found. 

His liberal gift to the fund of the Society has already been 
noticed. He gave also the land for the burying yard on the 
hill. He was by occupation a farmer. He died (without 
cliildren) January 20th, 1832, at the age of seventy-seven 
years. His residence wns on the Eidgefield road, east side, 
next to the Davenport place. 

Dea. Lewis H. St. John united with this Churcli in 1816, 
was chosen Deacon in 1841, and ordained the 17th of Octo- 
ber of that year. 

He was a quiet, earnest, spiritually minded man, a little 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHUKCH, 73 

above the average height, with a soft, pleasant voice, and 
gained the respect and good will of the people. His resi- 
dence was in Nod. He was by trade a cooper, and tilled the 
land. 

Deacon St. John died August 10th, 1867, aged seventy- 
four years. 

Dea. James Betts was born in Wilton. His father, David 
Betts, died while he was yet a boy. By great energy and 
self-denial he secured an education at the Academy, attended 
lectures in New Haven, and early began to teach. Some 
time after Mr. Hawley Olmstead had removed to New Haven, 
Mr. Betts rented his former residence, and brought to it his 
Family School for Boys. In 1844 he built a commodious 
house in Stamford, where he yet remains. His school- has 
been remarkably prosperous. One son, William J., gradu- 
ated at Yale, 1870, and another, Alsop Lockwood, a member 
of the Class of 1872, died in College. Deacon Betts was re- 
ceived to the Church in 1825, was elected and ordained Dea- 
con in 1841. In Stamford for thirty-two years he has well 
represented this Church and its influence upon its children. 

Dea. Oiles Gregory was born the 7th of October, 1806, and 
died February 20th, 1859. He was the youngest son of 
Moses and Abigail Gregory, the great-grandson (on his father's 
side) of Dea. Matthew Gregory ; on his mother's side, the 
grandson of Dea. Daniel Gregory. He was thus descended 
by each parent from one of the elder Deacons — Dea. Matthew 
Gregory and Dea. Benjamin Hickok. He was educated at 
the Academy, taught school many years, and, after his father's 
death in 1837, engaged actively as a farmer. He confessed 
Christ, May, 1842, was ordained Deacon the 2d of November, 
1849, and was active in Church, Society, and town affairs. 
His readiness to render pecuniary or personal aid to the poor, 
or those in distress, was hearty and efficient. His prayers in- 
dicated unfeigned humility ; his life testified to the genuine- 
ness of his faith. His early death, which occurred February 
19th, 1859, from typhoid fever, was lamented by many. He 
resided with his sisters in the house built bv, or for his grand- 



7-i ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

father, Ezra Gregory, about 1740, but was never married, 
Dea. W^aJceman Ilubbell, the son of Nathan and Sarah Hub- 
bell, was born in Wilton. He was firm, conscientious and 
earnest to a high degree. He was elected to the office of 
Deacon on the 8th of February, 1860, and ordained the 19th 
of March following, by his old Pastor, Eev. Sylvanus Haight. 
Of his character and work I will speak in another connection. 
Of those now in office — 

Dea. Charles Marvin, who was ordained Oct. 17, 1841 ; 
Dea. Benajah Gilbert, ordained March 19, 1860; 
Dea. Edward Olmstead, ordained May 1, 1870; and 
Dea. Eobert T. B. Easton, ordained May 1, 1870, 
you will not expect me to speak. Of the first three, whom 
I have long been permitted to regard as personal friends, it 
were easier for me to speak than to refrain. I may only 
say of the four, " their works praise them," and their Pastor 
is to be congratulated in having such counsellors and assist- 
ants in his work. 

Indeed, it may be said, the Deacons of this Church have 
(so far as I am informed) rarely, if ever, been wanting in 
fidelity to the Pastor or to the Church, or given occasion to 
the reproach that has of late years, justly or unjustly, in some 
parts of the country, fallen upon this ancient and most im- 
portant office, instituted by the Apostles of our Lord. One 
reason of their excellence may have been that the brethren 
here have so generally regarded the office as high and holy,, 
which they shrunk from undertaking. 

Before 1816 there was not in Wilton what was distinctly 
known as a Sabbath-schooL About that time the influence 
of revivals, which organized the Missionary Society of Con- 
necticut in 1798, the American Board in 1810, the American 
Bible Society, and what is now the Connecticut Home Mis- 
sionary Society in 1816, began to organize schools for instruc- 
tion, on the Lord's day, of the children of the jDOor and ir- 
religious parents, who commonly neglected public worship. 
In most parishes this work was unfortunately not undertaken 
by the Church as such, but by individuals, usually Church- 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 75 

members acting with the consent and by the advice of the 
Pastor, and soon or late forming some association or organi- 
zation to do this work, without any direct regard to the 
Church, to which the whole business properly belonged. 

Sixty years ago such a beginning was made here. We 
may be sure that Mr. Haight led, and that some of the excel- 
lent women ^ were engaged in it. Garments and shoes were 
prepared. When all was ready on Sunday morning a number of 
children from Huckleberry Hills and elsewhere flocked to the 
house of Mr. Nathan Davenport to put them on, and go in 
order to Sunday-school. At the close of public worship, 
they returned to the house, exchanged their new garments 
for their old ones, and went home, to think of what they had 
seen and heard, and repeat the process next Sabbath. This, 
of course, could last only a little while. But the school 
thus begun has grown strong and useful to this day. Com- 
paratively few have entered the Church in thirty years, who 
had not been members of the Sunday-school A list of its 
officers, teachers and pupils from the beginning, would con- 
tain the names of many whom we love to hold in lasting 
honor. And it will not, I trust, seem invidious ; if, singling 
out from the list one who, more than forty years as teacher or 
superintendent, w^as almost always at his post, till death suddenly 
carried him away in 1869, I mention the name of Wakeman 
Hubbell.j- Loyalty to truth, as he saw the truth, and to duty 
were conspicuous in his character. On a moderate amount of 
evidence it were easy to believe, that he consciously or uncon- 
sciously allowed himself to be influenced by those memorable 
words, which should have been cut into the grave-stone of 
that Mr. John St. John, the father of Bela St. John, who 
perhaps eighty years ago, w^hen rallied by one of the ma- 



* Miss Susan Comstock, daughter of Strong Comstock, and Miss Dolly Gregory, 
daughter of Moses Gregory, were, it is believed, active in this enterprise. Some years 
later Miss Comstock went, under the care of the American Board to the "Great Osage 
Mission," which was in Missouri and Arkansas. In October, 1822. she married Mr. 
(afterwards Rev ) William C. Requa. who was then Assistant Missionary, 'he was for 
some time in the service, and died, if I remember, at Little Rock, Arkansas. Miss 
Gregory desired to go with Miss Comstock, and attended the Company as far as New 
Jersey. She was in Wilton, in the day-school and Sundaj'-school, an efficient teacher 
till failing health and other causes prevented longer service. 

t He died suddenly in the field. Nov. 2, 1869, in the Tlst year of his age. 



76 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

jority for having voted, by rising, alone against the others, in 
a meeting of the Society, promptly replied : " If I am wrong, 
I ought to be alone ; but if I am right, I am not ashamed to 
be alone." 

It would be appropriate to this occasion, if time allowed, to 
mention the names of those who, by birth or adoption, belong 
to Wilton, who graduated at some college or literary institu- 
tion or professional school, or who studied law, medicine or 
theology, or became autliors, or were married to one of 
that class. I have prepared a table containing their names. 
Some of them were never members of this congregation, but 
they belonged to families once included in this parish, or 
were themselves for a longer or shorter period members of 
the Wilton Academy. Additions to that table will be wel- 
come. 

But among the many who were born and nurtured under 
the shadow of this Church, though not himself a member, 
whose subsequent life shed distinguished honor upon this 
town, none is more conspicuous than Moses Stuart ; whom 
it would ill befit us to pass without notice to-day. fie was 
born in 1780, in the house now owned and occupied by Abi- 
jah M. Jones, the son of Isaac and Olive Stuart. He read 
books with eagerness when four years old, but remained a 
farmer's boy with no thought of college, till, at fourteen, a 
thirst for knowledge was manifest which neither toil or years 
could quench. He went to Norwalk,* made rapid progress 
in the rudiments of Latin and French, and was fitted for the 
Sophomore class by Roger Minot Sherman, who had the pre- 
ceding year been a tutor at Yale. He graduated with the 
highest honor in the class of 1799, afterwards he taught in 
what was North Fairfield, and in Danbury ; studied law, was 
admitted to the bar at Danbury in 1802 ; became tutor at 
Yale from 1802 to 1804. There and afterwards he showed 
almost unsurpassed skill in awakening the enthusiasm of 
young men in their studies. But here the Spirit of the Lord 
met him and he heard the call which Paul heard — to preach 



* Prof. Park's sermon at his funeral 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 77 

the Gospel. He united with the College Church and studied 
theology with Dr. Dwight. His first and only settlement was 
as Pastor of the First Church in New Haven. It was an era 
(those almost four years of his pastorate are yet remembered 
there), during which above one hundred and seventy 
(172) were added to the Church by profession. His succes- 
sor, Rev. Dr. K W. Taylor, forty years later, spoke in the 
highest terms of his power as a preacher, reckoning liira 
second to none in this country. In 1810 he was wanted, as 
Professor of Hebrew and Greek, in the new Theoloo-ical 
Seminary at Andover, Mass. " We cannot spare him," said 
one of the Yale Faculty to the Rev. Dr. Samuel Spring, of 
Newburyport, who had come to New Haven to get Mr. 
Stuart's assent to the plan. " We want no man who can be 
spared " was Dr. Spring's reply. 

He went to Andover, as he himself said, with small knowl- 
edge of Hebrew, and of Greek Grammar less than many a 
student who this year enters college. In two years he had 
prepared a Hebrew Grammar, and, as there was no printer 
who understood the business, he was obliged to set a part of 
the types with his own hands. 

The work that Mr. Stuart did for the Ministry and the 
Charch in America, by promoting the study of the Bible in 
the original languages, and in awakening the enthiisiasm of 
young men who were to be ministers, in the study of biblical 
philology, is one of the extraordinary things of this wonder- 
ful century. He studied German when his brethren in the 
ministry trembled lest he should be poisoned with German 
rationalism. Thej little dreamed that he was preparing there- 
by to set up an immovable barrier against Unitarianism, and 
other religious errors. The multiplicity and value of his 
labors during the almost forty-two years of his residence 
at Andover, till his death, after a brief illness, Jan. 4th, 1852, 
may be inferred from the discourse delivered at his funeral 
by Professor Edwards A. Park. A copy of it might well be 
in this Sunday-school Library, and in every family, that can 
appreciate the honor such a man confers upon his native 
town. Some may remember his occasionally preaching here 



78 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

many years ago. But the spirit of the man is seen in the 
words with which he closed " Two Sermons on the Atone- 
ment : " " When I behold the glory of the Saviour as re- 
vealed in the gospel, I am constrained to cry out with the be- 
lieving Apostle, ' My Lord and My God ! ' And when my 
departing spirit shall quit these mortal scenes and wing its 
way to the world unknown, with my latest breath I desire to 
pray as the expiring martyr did, ' Lord Jesus, receive my 
spirit.' " [See also Prof. Phelps in the Advance, May, 76.] 

There was, perhaps, fifty years ago, a society of ladies in 
which were active Mrs. Haight and Mrs. Matthew Marvin, to 
aid the American Education Society, of which I have not 
seen the record. By the influence of Mrs, Merwin, the 
Ladies Sewing Society, called the " Ladies Home Missionary 
Association," held its first meeting at the house of Mr. Wake- 
man Hubbell, Sept. 14th, 1836. Twenty ladies were present, '^ 
Mrs, Merwin was the first President, and Miss Clara M. 
Gregory, Secretary and Treasurer, which office she holds 
now ; f Mrs. Willard was President eighteen years, till her 
death ; Mrs. Wakeman Hubbell was President till called to 
her reward ; Mrs. Merwin is now President, 

As a bond of sympathy among the sisters and families of 
the Church ; as an educator of the daughters who here or 
elsewhere have been called to labor for the Kingdom of 
Heaven ; as a means of raising funds for Home Missions and 
for other benevolent objects, and as an auxiliary in refitting this 
House of Worship ^ in 1844 ; in building the Chapel, and in 
providing furniture for the two houses, the Ladies Society has 
been invaluable. It is worthy of mention that since 1856 the 
Society has raised above two thousand dollars. A list of its 
oSicers and the roll of its members would recall faces, 
and persons, by whose self-sacrificing labors and wise plans 
we are benefited to-day ; who (many here may say) bound our 
young hearts to them by cords stronger than death ; who 
should be praised, if the world has been the better for our 



* See note. 

t Mrs. Helen Comstock was for several years in that office. 

$ See Appendix. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 79 

living; whose names are now graven on the stones 
in the burying-ground ; but whose best monuments are in the 
character and lives of the men and women of this assembly. 
Though " lost to sight," their presence is with us— a shield 
from temptation, an inspiration for duty. 

But the time forbids me longer to trespass upon your at- 
tention ; lest, like the " ancient mariner " of Coleridge, I cheat 
the hearers of the promised feast, which they may well be in 
haste to reach. 

The Church, which our fathers planted here with fastino- 
and prayer, one hundred and fifty years ago, has, by the good 
Providence of Him whose help they sougnt, not betrayed 
their trust, nor prematurely fallen into the decrepitude of an 
old age of poverty. It has borne precious fruit ; it is still 
vigorous with youth. Its blossoms, that are the fullest of 
promise, may sometimes wither, and its ripe fruit be gathered 
by the heavenly gardener ; but it is a tree drawing nourish- 
ment from the river of life. It has been highly favored with 
Pastors who were sound in the Faith — men of education, 
whom the Master had endowed for their work ; and who, 
with a single unhappy exception, continued faithful unto 
death. It has steadfastly maintained the doctrines of the Gos- 
pel. In matters of religion, of education, in its testimony for 
temperance and for morality, its influence has blessed the 
town, in which for three-quarters of a century it was the only 
Church. 

It has, since 1826, furnished at least eight men (six graduates 
of Yale, one of Williams, and one of Trinity) who are j^et in the 
Ministry. Whatever sins may have been justly laid at the 
door of individual members, the records show, and tradi- 
tion does not question that the Church, as a whole, has in the 
main been preserved from scandalous immoralities. It has 
not ceased to testify for Jesus, and to invite the wearj^ 
and heavy-laden to share in the blessings of the Gospel. 
It has cheered the toils and wiped the tears of the living; it 
has strengthened the faith of the dying. The fathers and 
mothers have fallen asleep, and the children have risen in 
their place till five generations have come and gone from the 



80 AXNIVERSARY OF THE 

house of the Lord. And yet this Church witnesses, that the 
promise is to us and our children ; and that, if they forsake 
not the God of their fathers. He will increase them more and 
more. Upon this fair heritage of hill and vale, refreshed by 
streams of water, and glorified by Christian homes. His face 
will continue to shine. The sons and daughters, who remain 
to worship on this hill of Zion, and to be buried amid their 
fathers' graves, and those whose lot is cast in other parts of 
the vineyard, will become precious stones and polished pil- 
lars in the spiritual temple, which forever ascendeth to the 
praise of God our Saviour, Jesus Christ. 



The "Pilgrim Fathers" was then sung by Mr. Robert J. 
Johnston. 

The Chairman — Ladies and Oentlemen: Wilton, as you 
have heard, has been quite fruitful in Ministers. The Com- 
mittee have selected one of them, who is of good Puritan 
descent, and bearing a good Puritan name, as the Poet of this 
occasion ; and I now present him to you — the Rev. John G. 
Davenport, of Bridgeport. 

POEM. 

Who'd think, to see her beaming 

In her fresh and bright array. 
That the Blessed Mother of us all 

Is a hundred and fifty to-day? 

I've studied her somewhat closely, 

With loving and reverent care ; 
But I've failed to discover a wrinkle 

Deforming her features so fair ! 

We're weaving a chaplet of honor. 

And crowning her with it now — 
But it covers no thread of silver 

On her peaceful, radiant brow ! 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 81 

The stranger who'd not heard recounted 
The years and the changes she's seen, 

Instead of a hundred and fifty 

Would think her but ''sweet sixteen "I 

How graciously she receives us ! 

How warm is her welcome to-day ! 
We're ready to blush as we greet her, 

To think that — we w^ent away ! 

But there's merit in separation — 

It's well for some children to roam ; 
No doubt she loves some of us better 

Than if we'd continued at home ! 

While so fresh and so youthful appearing, 

Her grasp neither feeble nor cold, 
We're proud of our dignified mother 

In part from the fact that she's old ! 

Why, think of it ! great is the honor, 

This famous Centennial time. 
Of owning a table rheumatic 

Or a chair truly worth not a dime ; 

If only the ricketty pieces 

Have come from the years far away ; 
The sunlight of decades departed 

With gold plates them over to-day ! 

A tea-cup some General's moustache 

Brushed lightly a century ago, 
Or a dress Mrs. Washington looked at, 

But didn't quite flmcy, yoa know ; 

Or a snuff-box that, daintily handled, 

Beguiled the fair ladies of yore— 
These things are esteemed above rubies 

In settins; of costliest ore I 



82 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

This year an old hat's in the fashion, 
Old houses are stylish and grand, 

And I fear that old hearts, and not new ones, 
Are the prevalent mode of the land ! 

Reversed is the sentiment uttered 
To Paul's dear Corinthian fold. 

New things have now passed away wholly, 
Lo, all things have now become old! 

Since such is the public condition. 
And age is more precious than gold, 

We're proud that our sacred Church mother 
Is a hundred and fifty years old ! 

They talk of the age of the Nation, 
And nudge all the world to recall 

That it rounds out a century's existence 
Some time between now and next Fall ! 

But over their pomp and their bluster 
We Wiltoners slyly must laugh, 

For, while they are keeping Centennial, 
We're keeping Centennial and a half! 

As of " seventy-six '' they are boasting. 
And telling its fame evermore. 

We'd like to inquire the condition 
Of things half a century before ! 

Where Ijien was the parchment conferring 
Independence on good "Uncle Sam "? 

Why, the sheep that afterward wore it 
As yet wasn't even a lamb ! 

Where then was the pen bravely wielded 
For Freedom, oppressed and forlorn ? 

The goose from whose pinions it fluttered 
Was still with the millions unborn ! 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 83 

And the hands that subscribed to the Charter, 

Equal liberty claiming for all, 
As yet had not managed a top-string 

Nor directed the flight of a ball ! 

And where was the bell, at whose fracture 

The nations now reverently stare? 
Not yet were its particles blended 

The pounding and pealing to share ! 

The tree that, though hacked with the hatchet, 

Will live while the ages shall die, 
Was a cherry-stone then, just rejected 

From good Mother Washington's pie! 

Ben Franklin, whose wisdom to honor 

The world now indulges the right. 
Was still ivearing the garments that furnished 

The tail of his thunderstruck kite ! 

The illustrious army of heroes 

That battled so bravely and well, 
As infantry yet were unmarshalled 

On the day of whose honors we tell ! 

Not one of the stars of our banner 

Had yet risen over the land, 
Not a stripe of the snow or the crimson 

Our Nation's horizon had spanned ! 

Enwrapped in the mists of the future, 
Its grandeur and beauty concealed. 

Our Royal Eepublic w^as waiting 
Till Time should a coronet yield ! 

This Church, at its birth, w^as a subject 

Of England's imperial sway ; 
To the First of the Georges it hastened. 

Its loyal obedience to pay ! 



84 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

Just think of it ! four of its Pastors 
Were wont to the altar to bring 

The earnest petition, " God bless him,. 
Our Sovereign Master the King ! " 

And the fourth may have finally added, 

" Please bless him — he needs it, we know- 
But help us to strike the old tyrant 
A blinding and withering blow !" 

Thus the brow of our mother was touched 
With the kiss of the long ago, 

And on her to-day our reverent love 
We eagerly all bestow. 

O, child of the far-off years ! 

0, mother benign and true ! 
With tender and grateful hearts 

Acknowledging all thy due ; 

Acknowledging all we owe 
To thy long and faithful years. 

To the truth thou hast patiently maintained, 
Though it cost thee pain and tears. 

Not in our name alone, 

But of all whom thou hast blessed, 
Thy family scattered far to-day. 

We hail thee "worthiest," "best!" 

Our gratulations we bring thee 

With regard that can never be told — 

God bless thee to-day, good mother, 
A hundred and fifty years old ! 

The Historian here has told us 

(Though we scarce can think it, still) 

That our good Church hasn't always dwelt 
On this consecrated hill ! 



WILTON CONCxREGATIONAL CHURCH. 

For many a year her mansion 
Was a mile or two farther down, 

But at length she thought it needful 
To see to this part of the town ! 

Thus often I've noticed a mother 

Removing her easy chair 
From a group of orderly children 

Toward certain demanding her care ! 

Just how it may be at the present 
I haven't the power to explain, 

But perhaps if she followed " the leadmgs 
She'd quickly return agam ! 

My childhood was very familiar 

With the scene of her primal abode. 

Though scarce a tradition suggested 
The place where her altars had glowed. 

No doubt as a bare footed urchin. 

In perfect abandon of play, 
I often have trampled "regardless" 

The spot where her " corner-stone lay. 

No doubt I have often been merry _ 
(Such thoughts strange emotions mtuse) 

Just where the good Parson, my grandsire. 
As a " candidate" shook in his shoes! 

And there in the shady pasture, 

Where his words, like dew distilled. 

Not thinking of spiritual sustenance, 
My basket with berries I filled ! 

I wonder that, in the stillness 
Of the Summer afternoon, 

1 caught no echo of the past- 
No snatch oi pious tune ! 



85 



86 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

That 'mid the ferns, and through the hedge,. 

And o'er the ledges bare, 
There breathed lio word of holy truth — 

No pleading voice of prayer ! 

'T would seem that sun- and star-light 

Must there forever rise. 
Like shimmering golden ladder rounds 

'Twixt earth and Paradise ! 

For sacred evermore must be 
The spot where Saints prepare, 

With sigh and psalm and sacrament 
Heaven's ministries to share ! 

Where stood the second house of prayer — 
Just off the broad highway — 

My childish feet have often roved 
At hour of setting day ! 

For where the Pastor fed liis flock. 

And warned from snares and sloughs. 
There, through the purple twilight sliade, 

I homeward drove the cows ! 

And oft I seemed to hear again 
The words that thrilled of j'ore— 

The testimony holy men 

To Christ's redemption bore ! 

And oft beside the Pastor's grave 

I knelt to read his fame. 
And wished his virtues might descend 

On all who bear his name ! 

And as I saw him in the midst, 

His Church asleejiy aiound, 
I wondered if 'twere ever thus 

Within their temple found ! 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH.' 87 

The spot is hallowed evermore, 

Where flock and shepherd lie, 
And silent wait till fadeless dawn 

Illume the Eastern sky. 

you who hold the ancient trust. 
Who still the homestead keep, 

1 pray you, guard with pious care 
Th' enclosure where they sleep ! 

Nor let the flaunting sumach there 

Display its crimson shield. 
Nor to the tramp of feeding brute 

The precious acre yield ! 

There slumber staid and saintly sires, 

Thcire dames of gentler grace ; 
They ask (what less can we bestow ?) 

An honored resting-place. 

Wherever else our mother dwelt, 

This, this to us is home, 
And dearer far than minster grand 

Of stateliest tower and dome ! 

Converges here the Sabbath light 

Of years long flown away, 
Illuming the familiar scene 

With sweetest, holiest ray ! 

Bright verdure now, and fragrant flowers, 

Our holy altars twine ; 
But mem'ry decks, with fadeless bloom. 

The consecrated shrine ! 

These sacred aisles, with reverent step. 

Our infant feet have trod ; 
We deemed them, as they were, the paths 

That lead to heaven and God. 



ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

These pews — I weary now to think 
How much of them I bore, 

With head upon the rail, and feet 
Some inches from the floor ! 

Good Parson Smith a marvel seemed. 

He had so much to say ! 
Relief I sought in fennel-seed 

And blessed caraway ! 

But sanctuary oak grew soft 
As, following good advice, 

I to the Pastor's sermon turned 
For my supply of spice. 

I this believe, I say it for 
The good of restless youth, 

The softest cushion for a pew, 
Is a wish to hear the truth ! 

At noon, along these galleries 

In Sunday-school we met. 
The girls and boys on either side 

In opposition set ! 

They thought it wise, perhaps it was. 

The pupils so to place — 
That with a gulf between, they looked 

Each other in the face ! 

But possibly occasion rose. 

For some to humbly pray 
Amid their lessons " Turn mine eyes 

From seeing vanity ! " 

If I am right, 'twas brother Mix, 

To his cognomen true, 
Who brought us to the floor below 

And rearranged us too ! 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 89 

But I shall never once forget 

The day I joined the school, 
And gave my name to be enrolled 

According to the rule ! 

" What's man's chief end ? " the teacher asked ; 

'Twas more than I could meet ; 
1 hung my head and steadfast gazed 

Upon my swinging feet ! 

Perhaps he thought in pantomime 

I thus essayed reply ; 
' Twas not my toes — and to the next 

He turned with heavy sigh ! 

Though I was stupid, he was good, 

And his successors all, 
The truths they taught shall light my path 

When death-shades 'round me fall ! 

When first I sought the House of God 

The choir seemed rather gaj^ 
The fiddle and the viol were there 

With Dr. Mead to play ! 

Perhaps I am not orthodox, 

But I could never see 
Why we to Satan's use should yield 

Their stirring melody ! 

The Psalmist used an " instrument" 
" With strings" that numbered " ten " ! 

What reason is there, one with four 
Should be forbidden then ? 

I well remember when the first 

Melodeon arrived. 
How strange it seemed that until then 

Without it we'd survived ! 



90 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

But soon one more pretentious came, 

Our Arthur * was its Icing, 
His magic fingers swept the keys 

And made the rafters ring ! 

But what now fills its honored place 

And moves the ear to bliss? 
I see no Tribune statement here 

That " not an Organ — this." 

I thought that Darwin's great idea 

Was scarcely proven true, 
But surely here's a striking case 

That bids us think anew ! 

Consider the " development" 

Within so brief a while. 
Of this Grand Johnston Organ f 

From Dr. Mead's bass-viol ! 

O Organ ! wilderness of tubes. 
With all thy glorious sweep 

Thy myriad loftier harmonies 
Thy pealing thunders deep ! 

Swell thou His praise who lives and reigns 

Though generations die ! 
Our lagging hallelujahs lift 

E'en to His courts on high! 

Exulting greet the Sabbath morn 

Oft as it dawns again ! 
Console the mourner with thy sobs. 

Speed the glad bridal train ! 

Reflect the sorrow and the joy 
Our loved ones here shall feel, 



* Dr. Arthur Barrows of New York. 

+ Mr. Johnston, the Chorister, took the initiative in procuring an Organ in which he 
was heartly supported. It was built by Geo. W. Earle, Riverhead, L. I. 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 91 

Inspire to high and sacred art, 
To patriotic zeal ! 

Thus breathe a blessing from thy tubes 

On all who gather here, 
Till heaven's eternal harmonies 

Break on their ravished ear ! 

What sacred and tender memories throng 

This consecrated space I * 
Cherubic and glorious wings must e'er 

O'ershadow the holy place ! 

Here has the smiling and dimpled babe 

To Him been lovingly given, 
Who said. " Permit the children to come 

For of such is the highest heaven." 

Here scores and hundreds have boldly stood, 
To acknowledge their Master's name, 

And solemnly consecrate themselves 
To the spread of His peerless fame ! 

And here has the chosen Pastor bowed 

His neck to the yoke of care ! 
The burden great of his people's weal 

Thenceforward to meekly bear ! 

And here has the blushing maiden saii 

To him who would have it so, 
" To leave thee again entreat me not — 

For whither thou goest, I'll go ! " 

And here with a gaze unspeakably sad 

And blinded with bitter tears 
We have looked our last at the peaceful face 

That had brightened our life for years. 



Between the pulpit and the pews. 



92 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

0, many a sacred and holy spot 

This beautiful earth can boast, 
But to scores here met — this Altar of God 

Is the place that is hallowed most ! 

Our brother has summoned to view 
The men who have ministered here. 

And their names as he called them, one by one. 
Fell musically on the ear ! 

And their forms as they slowly passed 

By his magic word invoked ! 
Seemed loftier than the sons of men 

And in saintlier purity cloaked. 

A lingering lustre c'ings 

To the spot where they plead for truth, 
And sought for the Master — manhood's strength 

And the fiery heart of youth ! 

A mantle of glory descends 
On the Pastor that ministers here, 

Whose folds so radiant e'er have wrapped 
The worthy and the dear ! 

No surplice of shimmering white 

Nor robe that a prelate w^ore, 
Compares with this tribute of love and power 

From those who have gone before ! 

Forgive me, but I recall 

A day when this mantle of might, 

Less warmly /here desired, than one 
That should bury me out of sight ! 

For on this very desk 

As an altar of sacrifice, 
My first-born sermon I offered up 

With countless fears and sighs ! 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 98 

Paul spoke of the " feeble knees " — ; 

And I well knew what he meant, 
For mine beneath their weight of woe 

Like reeds in a tempest bent ! 

And David tells of the tongue 

That cleaves to the roof of the mouth, 

And mine seemed firmly packed 
In the dust of an August drouth ! 

" You'll find my text," said I, 

And thereupon all grew dim. 
And I scarce could tell if 'twas Holy Writ 

That I needed to give, or a hymn ! 

And the congregation danced 

And whirled in a curious way, 
Decidedly festive it seemed to me 

For the holy Sabbath day ! 

And I thought — an earthquake now. 

If such a thing could be — 
Would bring a fitting reward to them 

And a great relief to me ! 

^iy heart — it quaked instead ! 

And I labored my sermon through, 
And it seemed that ere I could say " Amen" 

The sunset would be due ! 

But the agony closed at last, 

And I found as I went away, 
That while I claimed to have suffered, 

The people thought it was they ! 

And so this sacred desk 

O'er which bright memories break 
I still must regard, somewhat. 

As the martyr regards the stake ! 



94 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

Thus coming hither to-day 

We hasten the mansion round, 

And every part of the dear old home 
O'erflowing with interest is found ! 

I scarcely doubt that some — 

E'en paused in the vestibule, 
And thought " Just here she took my arm 

At the close of the singing-school ! " 

And others reflected thus — 

" Can it be that it was so ? 
That on this spot she turned away 

With a sharply answered ' No ' ? " 

How much of the joy and the sorrow 
The doubt and the hope and the fear, 

That our lives have known in the time gone by 
Must centre forever here ! 

To-day we look, how vainly, 

For faces once beaming here ; 
We close our eyes and they come again, 

With their olden smile, draw near. 

Fathers and mothers, sweet and grave — 
Who loved the House of God — 

Dear youths that early sought their rest 
Beneath the daisied sod ! 

The men who bore along these aisles 

The consecrated bread ! 
The trusting shepherd who, his flock. 

To peaceful pastures led ! 

The little child with pattering feet — 

The strong man in his pride. 
The school-boy with his modest air, 

The blissful, blooming bride ! 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 95 

They come again ! we see them take 

The place they filled of old, 
A large and precious portion 

Ot this dear flock and fold ! 

We look again ! It was a dream ! 

Their faces melt in air ! 
But hark! a voice celestial breathes 

" Look up ! they're gathered there ! " 

O, brothers, sisters, blest the tie. 

That binds us to our home ; 
That to this household links us still 

Where'er our feet may roam ! 

And blest the immortal tie that binds 

To that dear shadowy throng, 
That, just a little farther on 

In life, has passed along ! 

These silken chords our hearts will draw 

Toward all that's good and true, 
Till we with those we love shall meet 

Beyond the arch of blue ! 

And so, dear Mother Church, 

We cluster round thy knee ; 
And pray thee bless us every one 

Thy loyal family. 

Our filial love for thee 

Is pure as the purest gold, 
God bless thee our precious mother, 

A hundred and fifty years old ! 

The exercises of the morning were concluded with singing 
"Old Hundred." 



96 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

EXERCISES AFTER COLLATION. 

The Chairman — The Committee having bestowed upon 
me full autocratic power, and all here feeling, I suppose, 
pretty comfortable after the bountiful collation which has 
been furnished by the ladies, I shall undertake to call upon 
some of you to give us a little after-dinner talk — nothing elo- 
quent, but good, plain, humorous, pleasant after-dinner talk. 

Now, the next best thing to being born and living here, I 
think, is to marry a wife in Wilton ; and I see in the audience 
a gentleman who had that rare good fortune. Rev. Mr. Mix 
will please come forward. 

The reverend gentleman acknowledged his position in 
fitting words, extending affectionate greetings from the Pres- 
byterian Church in Orange, N. J., of which he is Pastor. 

The Chairman — Ladies and Gentlemen: I want to say a 
word about Ministers. When I was a boy, and they used to 
stand up in the pulpit, pretty high up, with plenty long 
sermons, I don't know why, but somehow or other I didn't 
get a very good impression of them ; but since, as I have 
walked through life with them on the same plane, I find that 
there is in the Ministers of to-day a good deal of human 
nature, and I don't know as they are very much worse than 
the generality of men. I have a love and respect for the old 
school of Ministers, and we fortunately have one of them 
with us here to-day — a gentleman who commenced the 
academical course of his education, as I understand, at the 
Wilton Academy almost at its foundation, and who has taken 
high rank in the profession to which he has devoted the 
energies of a long and well-spent life. I present to you 
the Rev. Dr. Bouton, of Concord, New Hampshire. 

REMARKS OF REV. DR. BOUTON. 

Mr. President: I wish, first of all, to thank the Com- 
mittee and the good people of Wilton for giving me an 
invitation to attend this Anniversary. Within five minutes 
after I received your invitation I said, " I will go," and I re- 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 97 

peated it to my family as soon as 1 met them, "I am going 
to Wilton." Well, a little wonder was expressed why I 
should be so interested to go to Wilton, but I told them that 
I had an interest in Wilton, and an interest that would lead 
me there on this occasion. I have a long time, Mr. President 
and people of Wilton, I have a long time carried a burden 
which has weighed upon me whenever I have thought of it. 
I am greatly in debt to Wilton, and I have wished for an 
opportunity to pay that debt in such coin as is at my com- 
mand. I will tell you what that debt is, if you will 
indulge me in a few moments' remarks. Perhaps it may 
take a little longer time than the gentleman took who 
mixed things up. But to begin, sir. I have an interest 
in Wilton on the ground of soil. I am accustomed 
to look somewhat at old records, and I looked at the old 
Connecticut records — the Colony records of Connecticut — and 
I found when in May, 1726, a petition was presented to the 
General Court of Connecticut for the laying oif of the parish 
of Wilton from the town of Norwalk into a village (that was 
the language), the line ran through Richard Bouton's and 
Joseph (or some other name) Betts' land, and Richard Bou- 
ton's came within the bounds of this village of Wilton. 
Well, who was Richard Bouton? He was a son of tlie 
original ancestor of the Bouton name, settled in Norwalk, 
John Bouton, Senior. And besides that particular connection 
there was another on which I claim a still higher and deeper 
interest than even that, for Richard Bouton was the grandson 
of Matthew Marvin, Senior — himself of Norwalk, but whose 
descendants are here — and Matthew Marvin is an honored 
name in the town of Wilton, long to be remembered by this 
people. Well, now it just happened in this way. That John 
Bouton, Senior, came over the same year (1635) with Matthew 
Marvin. They went together to the town of Hartford, and 
there remained till 1651. Together John Bouton and Matthew 
Marvin were admitted as freemen in the Colony of Connec- 
ticut the same year and at the same session of the Court_ 
They came to Norwalk together in 1651. In 165(j John 
Bouton married the daughter of Matthew Marvin, and Rich- 



98 ANISIVERSARY OF THE 

ard Bouton was the son of John, so that Matthew Marvin, 
Senior, was the grandfather of Eichard Bouton ; and in that 
line 1 stand, so that I claim a right of soil in Wilton and a 
relationship to some of your best families. 

Well, now, a little further, Mr. President. I said I owe a 
great debt to Wilton, and that debt came of my education. 
I commenced study in 1817, and, while attending school a 
little while at Norwalk and a little while at New Canaan, I 
received an invitation from the Rev. Sylvanus Haight, bring- 
ing to me a message from Hawley Olmstead, inviting me to 
come to the school which he had then recently opened just 
across the road here. There is where I closed my prepara- 
tion for college, and from there went with the recom- 
mendation of my honored instructor, Hawley Olmstead, and 
was received into Yale College, 

While I am speaking on that subject, I wish to say that 
then my debt was contracted. I became acquainted with 
very many families in Wilton, and they were kind enough 
to entertain me, and I never think of it but with feelings of 
deepest gratitude and obligation to the good people of Wilton ; 
and I have often thought with myself, if I ever have an 
opportunity I will pay that people for their kindness to me. 
I was not a school-master then, but I boarded around by par- 
ticular invitation ; and I have tried to recall the names of the 
families that were pleased so kindly to entertain me. I may 
omit some of them — very likely I shall — but I will endeavor 
to pay my debt by naming the great kindness of Matthew 
Marvin and his family to me during that year of m}'- resi- 
dence here; to Captain William Sellick, who, I believe, lived 
on the brow of Belden's Hill. The next name that I have is 
Mr. Nathan Hubbell and his wife, never to be forgotten; and 
I often thank the Lord that out of that family, perhaps, 
partly the reward of a cup of cold water, if nothing more, 
one of the sons that went to the Academy with me has been 
an honored Minister of the Gospel for years, and I suppose is 
still living. And then that beloved elder brother, Dea. 
Wakeman Hubbell, who, the last time I was here, took me 
all over town and reminded me here and there of the places 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 99 

wliere I had been ; and the Lord has put two of his sons into 
the Ministry. Besides Mr. Nathan Hubbell, I remember Mr. 
Levi Scribner and his wife, now among the oldest people of 
Wilton. God bless them in their old age — ninety-four, I am 
told, Mr. Scribner has attained to, and ninety his wife. Well 
then, again, I remember the Middle brooks (Jonathan I be- 
lieve the name was) up on this road towards Eidgefield, and 
the Comstocks in another part of the town, and Mr. Lewis 
Betts in the western part of the town — all of whom enter- 
tained me, and I wish to thank them to-da}^, and out of the 
fulness of ray heart I do thank them. I will tell you, Mr. 
President, that when I have been under the inspiration of the 
Ministry, and have felt like working for the Master, I have 
felt constantly the inspiration that came upon me — an inspira- 
tion of gratitude for the goo 1 people that helped me on in 
my education. And now I thank the people of Wilton, and 
all the descendants of those families and others, for their 
kindness to me in the days of my youth. 

Well, among my memories, Mr. President, I remember cer- 
tain excellent women of Wilton. I like all good women, al- 
ways did, but there were some that were ^^ gooder, " at least I 
thought they were very good and I held them in very high 
esteem. Now, if the other ladies won't deem it invidious, 
I wish to name certain good women. I had a most profound 
respect and even reverence for the piety and good sense ot 
Mrs. Matthew Marvin, and I held in equal honor, I think, 
Mrs. Nathan Hubbell. and I had a profound respect for the 
wife of the Rev. Sylvanus Haight. But among others I re- 
member a Miss Dolly Gregory with great pleasure. I used to 
walk on the same road sometimes going to Mr. Sellick's 
and often fell in with Miss Dolly. There was this excellence 
about her ; she was one of the active young women of this 
•Church and she was one of the persons alluded to in the 
speech to-day, that took the liberty, perhaps with the 
consent of the Pastor, to open a Sunday-school. I had a 
Sundav-school off in this direction and she had one over in 
this direction. And then besides Miss Dolly Gregory there 
was Miss Dolly Hoyt and there was a Miss Susan Comstock. 



100 ANNIVERSARY OF THE 

Thej were remarkably pious and excellent j'oung women, 
and those two last, having the grace of God in their hearts, 
the love of Christ burning in a flame there, were not content 
to minister to Sunday-schools in Wilton, but went out as 
missionaries, and I suppose, spent their lives and died as mis- 
sionary teachers. 

Well, now, there are certain other reminiscences of which I 
would speak. I wish to say that there was no man in my 
youth, no man in later years, for whom I entertained a higher 
respect and a higher reverence than for Hawley Ohnstead, 
Esq. He esteemed me more highly than I deserved, but, I 
am sure, I loved him not more than he deserved. I heard 
the first prayer that he ever offered in his school, and it so 
impressed me at the time, that I remember to this day one 
sentence in it, and that, was, I think, in these very words: 
" That we might consider ourselves as strangers and sojourn- 
ers upon earth, a lodging place only for the night until the 
day dawn that shall never end." That was one petition in 
his prayer. 

Well, then, of Rev. Sylvanus Haight, sir, he was my friend. 
He took me by the hand, he opened the way for me to go in- 
to that school, and Mr. Haight was my friend as long as he 
lived. I look upon it as one of the remarkable favors of 
Divine Providence, that I was permitted to be with him and 
to offer prayer with him just before he died. It came to pass 
in this way. I started on my way for the Christian Commis- 
sion in 1864, and heard on the way that Mr. Haight was 
sick. I immediately went to his chamber. There he was 
lying upon his sick-bed, and as all supposed his dying-bed. 
I talked with him a few moments, expressed my thanks to 
him for his goodness to me, and then said he, " Will you 
pray ? " I knelt down by his bedside, putting my hands up- 
on the pillow where he was dying, and next morning the 
news came to me ; Mr. Haight is dead. Well, now, about 
his eloquence, about his character as a preacher. I could 
heartily respond to what was said by the historian to-day in 
several respects, and I have an impression to this day of one 
of those sermons. It was on the Judgment Day. He rose in 



WILTON CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH. 101 

that sermon to a very high pitch of eloquence ; it was 
solemnly and awfully impressive. I remember, on that 
occasion, speaking about the solemnity of the Great Day 
of Judgment, he said, among other things, " It seems to me 
that no man can look forward to the scenes of the 
Judgment without a degree of fear and trembling. I am 
sure I cannot." Well, there was Mrs. Elias Betts, one of the 
most remarkably pious women that I ever knew, and under 
that sermon, overwhelmed as she was, she literally went away 
trembling, and to her, above almost any Christian woman I 
ever knew, might be applied the language of the Prophet or 
the language of God through the Prophet, " The High and 
lofty One who inhabiteth eternity dwelleth in the high and 
holy Place, yet also with him that is of a contrite and humble 
spirit and that trembletli at my word." That Christian wo- 
man always trembled under God's great truth. 

Well, Mr. President, I will not enlarge ; I have taken up 
too much time already, but I desire to repeat again my thanks 
to the good people of Wilton for their kindness to me in the 
days of my youth, and for the inspiration that their aid gave 
me, to do what was in my power for the cause of the Blessed 
Master. 

I ought to say that in that regard I have not been without 
a blessing. After completing my college course I went directly 
to Andover Theological Seminary and the very day that I 
dosed my studies at Andover I received application from a 
gentleman to go as a candidate to the Church in Concord, New 
Hampshire. I went and have been there to this time. I was 
Pastor of the First Church forty-two years, and then resigned. 
In that period God blessed my labors so far that over seven hun- 
dred were admitted to the Church of which I was Pastor, a larger 
number were baptized, and I have had a very happy relation 
with that people, never a ripple on the surface of things from 
the day of my ordination till this time. Having resigned my 
pastorate after forty-two years, I am now one of the parish- 
ioners, sitting every Sabbath in my seat, and conscious, 
through the goodness of God, of having the ftivor still of the 
people, and though I resigned my situation after forty-two years 



102 .A.NNIVERSARY OF THE 

of service, I have been well employed during the last ten years^ 
and hope through the goodness of God to do a little more 
service for the Master. During all the time I have never been 
sick. I have never been laid aside from my work, I have 
been enabled to go in and out year after year without any in- 
terruption, and so having obtained help of the Lord I continue 
till this day. I may never have another opportunity, but this^ 
I say truly and heartily to this beloved people, I thank you for 
your goodness to me, and I bid the children and children's 
children of those who helped me farewell. 

Two verses of " All hail the power of Jesus' name " was 
sung to Coronation^ in which the congregation heartily joined. 

The Chairman — This Church is so closely connected with 
the Norwalk Church, I believe a good many of you here 
would like to hear from some one from that town. I call on 
the Rev. Mj-. Dunning of South Norwalk. 

In the absence of the Rev. Mr. Hamilton of the First 
Church, Norwalk, the Parent Church, Mr. Dunning grace- 
fully responded for the South Norwalk Church, the youngest 
of the five daughters. 

The Chairman — The ministers and teachers and doctors 
have had something to say here, and now I think the lawyers 
ought to be heard. I understand Mr. Eugene Smith of New 
York is in the house, and he will now address ypu. 

Mr. Smith obeyed, and in well-chosen words confessed to 
the bonds which tie him to the spot of his boyhood years. 

Mr. N. M. Belden of Southport, Dr. Bela St. John of Wol- 
cottville, and C. L. Westcott, Esq., of New York, answered 
to their names when called upon, and bore grateful testimony 
to the joy and glory of the occasion which had brought them 
here. 

Rev. Mr. Willard then read a letter from Rev. Mr. Har- 
vey, also a list of Wiltonian graduates from different 
American colleges; after which the choir and congregation 
joined in singing " Hold the Fort," and the audience was 
dismissed witli the benediction bv Rev. Mr. Merwin. 



APPENDIX. 



The names ©f the signers of the petition, that Wilton might be tonsti- 
tuted » " parish or village," were : 



JOSEPH BLMER, 
JOSEPH JUMP, 
DANIEL ABBOTT, 
JOSEPH CARLE, 
JOHN KEBLEE, 
MATTHEW ST. JOHN, 
DAVID KEELER, 
JOHN ST. JOHN, 
DAVID BETTS, 
SAMUEL BETTS, Ja., 
STEPHEN BETTS, 
NATHANIEL 8LAUS0N, 
JOHN WOOD, Jb., 
JONATHAN WOOD, Jb., 
NATHAN BETTS, 

WILLIAM 



DANIEL TROWBRIDGE, 
NATHAN OLMSTEAD, 
STEPHEN BUCKINGHAM, 
JOHN STUART. 
BENJAMIN HICKOK, 
RICHARD BOUTON, 
OBADIAH WOOD, 
THOMAS BOUTON, 
JAMES TROWBRIDGE, 
JONATHAN STURDEVANT, 
RALPFT KEELER, 
JACHIN GREG0R7, 
JOHN DUNNING, 
NATHANIEL KETOHUM, 
JOHN TAYLOR, 
PARKER. 



II. 

The Managers chosen at the first meeting of the Ladies' Society (1836) 
were mostly young ladies. These names, as they stand on the list, are : 
Mrs. William Belden, Mrs. Harriet (Charles) Gregory, Miss Susan Merwin 
(Mrs. George I. Wood), Miss Maria Handle (Mrs. William Ogden), Miss 
Mary Cole, Miss .Jane Munroe, Miss Jane E. St. John (Mrs. Cyrus Ray- 
mond), Miss Susan Hoyt, Miss Susan Comstock, Miss Mary E. Comstock 
(Mrs. Lewis Keeler), Miss Mary Middlebrook (Mrs. Harris), Mias Louii* 
Jessup (Mrs. Thomas B. Gunning). 

IIL 
The following persons were teachers of the Academy for brief periods. 
Some of the dates are approximate only: 

Xenopben Betts - • - 1823 William E. Watrous - - 1842-43 

StorrsHall - . - - 1840-41 Odle Close 1843-44 

Charles Jones - - - - 1843-44 James G. Rowland - - 1846-49 

George William Burr - 1844-45 N. Marvin Belden - - - 

IV. 
For the Fair in aid of the Church Repairing Fund, held June 26th 
and 27th, 1844, at the house of Mr. Nathan Comstock, the following Com- 



104 APPENDIX. 

mittees were appointed some weeks earlier at a meeting of the Ladies' 
Society. It is safe to believe that a much larger number rendered valu- 
able service at the Fair : 

Committee of Superintendence — Miss Dolly Gregorj^ Mrs. James Betts, 
Mrs J«hn Smith. 

Committee on Ice Cream — Mrs. Charles Marvin, Mrs. George B. Middle- 
brook, Mrs. George H. Randle. 

Committee for Sale of Ice Cream — Misses Mary Ferris and Susan E. 
Comstock. 

To Arrange the Tailea—Mra.C. Marvin, Mrs. G. H. Randle, Mrs. Legrand 
Comstock ; Misses C. M. Gregory, Clara Willard and Mary Randle. 

To Sell Fancy Articles— Misa C. M. Gregory, Miss C. Willard, Mrs. S. 
Comstock, Miss Martha Keeler, Miss Ann Olmstead and Miss Mary 
Randle. 

To Sell Books — Misses Susan Dudley, Charlotte Betts and Elizab' th 
Willard. 

To Attend th0 Jtefreshment Tables, were nominated— Mrs. Willard, Mrs. 
S. P. Randle, Mrs. Maria Ogden; probably many others served. 

Door-Keepers — Sylvester D . Willard, Charles M. Gregory. 

General Assistants in Preliminary Preparations — Messrs. Legi'and Keeler, 
Legrand Comstock, Lockwood K. Ferris, G. H. Randle and Dr. Syl- 
vester Mead. 

Charles St. John, of New York, was very helpful as Auctioneer at the 
Fair. 



The influence of the Church through its Pastor, Dr. Lewis, in favor of 
education is seen in the four young men (his two sons, also David Bel- 
den and Matthew Marvin), whom he is supposed to have fitted for Col- 
lege. Professor Stuart and Rev. William Belden were born during his 
ministry. 

For the last sixty years the influence of the Academy, which, without 
the Church had not existed, has been so marked, that it is thought best 
to append a table showing the names of natives and adopted sons of 
Wilton, who were graduates of College, or entered one of the learned pro- 
fessions, or were authors, editors or teachers ; also of ladies who them- 
selves, or whose husbands, belonged to one of these Classes. The table 
is necessarily incomplete, but may be helpful to those who celebrate the 
Centennial of the town, or the second Centennial of the Church: 

David Lambert (Y. C. 1761). 

Dea. Matthew Marvin (Y. C. 1785), died 1842. He was the son of 
Matthew Marvin and the sixth in descent from Matthew Marvin, one 
of the first settlers of Norwalk. 

Rev. David Beldbn (Y. C. 1785), died 1832. Took orders in the 
Episcopal Church. Afterwards eng^aged in farming, and resided in the 



APPENDIX. 105 

upper part of Pimpewaug, on tlie west side of the road, near its junction 
with the Sugar Hollow turnpike. 

Rev. Zechariah Lewis, and Rev. Isaac Lewis, D.D. (twin sons of 
Rev. Isaac Lewis, D.D.), born January Ist, 1773, graduated at Yale 1794. 
Useful and honored in many ways. (See Sprague's Annals, vol. 1, p. 
666.) Zechariah died in Brooklyn, N. Y., November 14th, 1840; Isaac 
died in New York, September 23d, 1854. 

Prof. Moses Stuart (Y. C. 1799), died 1852. See page 76. 

Rev. William Belden (Y. C. 1803), died 1861. Born July 16th, 1781. 
Son of Azor Belden. From 1812 to 1831 he was Pastor at Greenfield, and 
Teacher there and afterwards at Fairfield ; also in 1824 to 1843 in New 
York City. Resided in Brooklyn 1858 to 1861 . 

Ben.jamin Belden, M.D. Son of Azor Belden. Physician, New York 
City. Still lives. 

Lewis Belden, M.D. (Princeton, 1811). Physician, New York City. 
Died 1831. Son of Azor Belden. 

Charles Belden M.D. (Princeton, 1812). Son of Azor Belden. 
Teacher. Died, in New York, "about fifty years ago." 

Ebenbzer Sebley, son of Ebenezer (Y. C . 1814). Born April 6th, 1793 . 
Lawyer, many years in New Haven ; afterwards in New York, where he 
died, January 23d, 1860. 

Hawley Olmstead, LL.D. (Y. C. 1816), died 1868. See page 53. 

Isaac M. Sturges (Union, 1817), died 1850. Son of Ezekiel Sturges ; 
lived a farmer at Wilton, and died July 15th, 1850, aged sixty-two years. 

David Hull Belden, son of Rev. David Belden, lawyer at Newtown, 
States Attorney, died a few years since. 

Dea. Charles Marvin (Y. C. 1823). Son of Dea. Matthew Marvin. 
Farmer, banker, several times member of the Legislature, and bank com- 
missioner. 

Rev. Stephen Htjbbell (Y. C. 1826). Sou of Nathan and Sarah 
Hubbell. Ordained at Mount Carmel, May 18th, 1830 ; dismissed 1836. 
Ins ailed at Wolcottville, February 29tb, 1837; dismissed September 
29tti. 1839. Pastor at East Avju, December 31st, 1849, to July 1st, 1853. 
Pastor at North Stonington, August 17th, 1853, to April 6th, 1869. 
Paptor at Long Ridge, 1869 to October 28th, 1873. Resides at Mount 
Carmel, Conn. 

Dea. Ira Gregory. M.D. (Yale Med. School, 1839). Son of Moses and 
Abigail Gregory. Born January 31s% 1804. Practised medicine at 
Moilches, Long Island, 1829-1840, and at Norwalk 1840-1872. Deacon 
in the First Church at Norwalk many years. Died September 2d, 1872. 

Dea. James Betts. See Deacons. 

David Lambert (Trinity, 1836). Lawyer, editor. Died 1849. 

Isaac M. Sturges- Son of Erastus Sturges. Lawyer; oflSce in Bridge- 
p Drt. 



106 APPENDIX. 

Rev. Samuel J. M. Merwin (Y. C. 1839). See page 66. 

William C. Betts, M.D. (Yale Med. School, 1843). Son of David 
Betts. Physician in Brooklyn, N. Y. Died 1871. 

Rev. Levi Wakemajt. Son of William. Not a native, but from early 
life a resident of Wilton. Learned a trade with Alfred Mallory at Nor- 
walk. Studied in New Haven. Entered the Ministry (Baptist) about 
thirty years ago. Preached in Stepney, W. Woodstock and New Hart- 
ford. Resides in Stamford, Conn. 

Lewis R. Hurlbutt, M.D. (Y. C. 1843). Son of John and Elizabeth 
(Ogden) Hurlbutt. Principal of Bacon Academy, Colchester, 1843-1845; 
Grammar School, Hartford, 1845-1847. Tutor in Yale College 1847- 
1850. Physician and surgeon, Stamford, Conn. 

Charles Jones (Y. C. 1843). Son of Capt. John Jones. Teacher in 
Wilton Academy 1843-1844. Member of Legislature of Connecticut 
1844. Lawyer, New York City. Residence, Brooklyn. 

Rev. John H. Betts (Trinity, 1844). Son of Capt. Ira Bett8. Rector 
in the Episcopal Church in New Hartford and elsewhere. 

Dea. Edward Olmstkad (Y. C. 1845). See Deacons. 

Rev. Samuel G. Willard (Y. C. 1846). Son of Dr. David and Abby 
(Gregory) Willard. Ordained Pastor at Willimantic, November 8th, 
1849 ; dismissed September 8th, 1868. Installed Pastor at Colchester, 
September 23d, 1868. Member of Y. C. Corporation 1867. 

Sylvester D. Willard, M.D. (Albany Med. College, 1847). Son of 
Dr. David and Abby (Gregory) Willard. Born June 19th, 1825. Sec- 
retary of the New York State Medical Society 1857-1865 Practising 
physician at Albany, N. Y. Surgeon-General 1865. Died April 2d, 1865. 
Aided to found the Willard Asylum for the Insane at Ovid, N. Y., which 
was named from him. 

Theodore Benjamin. Son of George. Grandson of Dr. Abram Chi- 
chester. Born about 1825. Removed to Rochester, N. Y., about 1832. 
Reported to have entered the Ministry. 

John A. Betts, M.D. (Yale Med. School, 1848). Son of David Betts. 
Brother of Dea. James Betts. Practising physician at Brooklyn, N. Y., 
where he now resides. 

Roger S. Olmstead, M.D. (Yale Med. School, 1849). Son of Hon. 
Hawley Olmstead. Entered Yale ; studied medicine ; practised in 
Brooklyn, N. Y. Resides now in Omahi, Neb. 

N. Marvin Belden (Trinity, 1849). Son of John A. Belden. Grand- 
son of Rev. David Belden, and of Nathan Marvin. Tutor in Trinity. 
Resides in Southport. 

Rev. Henry L. Hubbell (Y C. 1854). Eldest son of Deacon Wake- 
man and Julia Lynes Hubbell. Ordained at Amherst, Mass., April 24th, 
1861; dismissed April 5th, 1865. Acting-Pastor in Unionville, Conn. 
Pastor elect Ann Arbor, Michigan, since 1869. 



APPENDIX. 107 

Rev. James W. Huhbell (Y. C. 1857). Son of Deacon W. and Julia 
L. Hnbbell. Ordained at Milford, September 21st, 1864 ; dismissed 
June 1st, 1868. Installed June 10th, 1868, College Street Church, New 
Haven. 

Eugene Smith (Y. C. 1859). Son of Matthew and Mary A. (Daven- 
port) Smith. Born in New York Cit)'. Resided in Wilton most of the 
time until after graduation. Lawyer. Resides in New York City. 

CoLET James. Entered Trinity, 1857. Did not graduate, lleceived 
A. M. from Trinity, 1869. 

John Henry Hurlbutt. Entered Trinity in 1858, Class of '63, and 
left June, 1860. 

Bela St. John, M.D. Son of Bela St. John. Practised dentistry sev- 
eral years in Danbury ; is in geu' ral practice in Wolcottville, Conn. 

George Pillow. Son of Seih Fillow. Graduate of State Normal 
School ; teacher in Hartford several years. Residence, Wilton. 

Samuel T. Jones. Son of John and Mary (Thorp) Jones. Born De- 
cember 20th, 1834. Lawyer in New York 1855-1873. Clerk of U. S. 
District Court. U. S. Commissioner. Died December 24th, 1873. 

Samuel H. Olmstead, M.D. (Yale Med. School, 1861). Son of Hawley 
Olmstead. In practice of medicine and surgeryat Brooklyn, N. Y. 

J. Belden Hurlbutt. Son of John Hurlbutt, Jr. Lawyer ; office in 
Norwalk. Acting School Visitor in Wilton. 

Rev. John Gatlord Davenport (Williams, 1863). Son of Charles A. 
and Sarah (Gaylord) Davenport. Pastor, East Bridgeport, Conn. Or- 
dained July 1st, 1868. 

Rev. Lewis Gregory (Y. C. 1864). Son of Charles and Harriet (Clark) 
Gregory. Grandson of Moses. Ordained October 15th, 1868, Pastor, 
West Amesbury, Mass.; dismissed 1875 to go to Lincoln, Neb., where he 
is now acting-Pastor. 

Clarence L. Westcott (Y. C. 1864). Son of George B. and Arethusa 
(Lincoln) Westcott. Lawyer, New York City. 

Charles F. Morgan, M.D. (Y. C. Med. School, 1866). Son of Charles 
A. and Electa B. Morgan. Physician in practice at Norwalk. 

Samuel Keeler (Y. C. 1867). Son of Legrand W. and Catharine 
(Lockwood) Keeler. Lawyer, New York City. 

Strong Comstock (Y. C. 1867). Son of Capt. James and Harriet 
(Betts) Comstock. Teacher, Walton, N. Y. 

Gordon Hall, A.B. (Amherst, about 1869). Son of Rev. Gordon Hall, 
D.D. Banker, Northampton, Mass. 

Daniel Davenport (Y. C. 1873). Son of Judge George A. and Mary 
(Sturges) Davenport. Lawyer, Bridgeport. 

Timothy Davenport (Y. C. 1875). Brother of Daniel. Law student. 

Benjamin Davenport. Brother of preceding, and member for a time 
of Class of 1875, Y. C. Lawyer, Washington, D. C. 



108 APPENDIX. 

David R. Lambert. Son of Samuel Lambert, and member for a 
time of Class of 1875, Y. C. Residence, Wilton. 

Samuel E. Morgak, M.D. (Yale Col. Med. School, 1875). Son of 
Charles A. and Electa B. Morgan. Residence, Wilton. 

Charles Gilbert (W. C. 1870). Son of Dea. Benajah and Fanny 
(Keeler) Gilbert. 

L Chauncey Sturges (graduated at Berkley DIt. School, Middle- 
town, 1876). Son of J. Randall Sturges. Residence, Kent, Conn. 

Frederic D. Benedict (tw© years at Y. C. in Class of 1867 ; Danville 
Tbeo. Sem., Kentucky). Son of I. Newton and Emily (Keeler) Benedict. 



Susan Comstock (Mrs. Requa), d. Strong. Missionary of Am. Board 
in 1822 to Osage Indians. Married Rev. William 0. Requa. 

Ann Hubbbll (Mrs. Dr. Nash), d. Nathan Hubbell. Married Mr. Burr, 
of Fairfield, who died early. One son, George William Burr, member 
for a time of the Class of 1846 Y. C. ; afterwards a lawyer in New York, 
who died about 1860. Married Dr. William B. Nash, Bridgeport, who 
died in 1873. Resides in New Haven. 

Jane Belden (Mrs. Booth), d. Rev. David Belden. Married Reuben 
Booth (Y. C. 1816), lawyer, Lieut. -Gov. Connecticut. Resided in Dan- 
bury. Died 1844. 

Abbt Geegoby (Mrs. Dr. Willard), d. Moses. Born April 20th, 1797. 
Married Dr. David Willard, December 22fll, 1818. Died January 3d, 1857. 

Henrietta Belden (Mrs. Dr. Stone), d. Col. William and Mrs. Becca 
Belden. Married Dr. Stone and went South. Both died early. 

Maeia Hubbell (Mrs. Dr. Lewis), d. Nathan Hubbell. Married Dr. 
Lewis, of Brockport, N. Y. 

Haeeiet Cannon (Mrs. Todd), d. George Cannon. Married about 1834 
Rev. Charles Todd, Rector of the Episcopal Church in Wilton. She died 
in Huntington, Conn., 1849. 

Esther M. Tayloe, d. Levi Taylor. About 1838 married Dr. Ambrose 
L. White, surgeon, U. S. A. Died 1876. 

Louisa Jessup (Mrs. Gunning), d. William and Nancj' (Odell) Jessup. 
■Graduate of Rutgers Institute ; teacher in New York. Married about 
1844 Dr. Thomas B. Gunning, dental surgeon, New York. 

Elizabeih Jessup (Mrs Reed), d. William. Marriul James Reed, editor 
■of the Norwalk Gazette, and now, for many years, editor of the AsLtabula 
Telegraph, Ohio. 

Emily Jessup, d. William. Gradu ite of Mt. Holyoke ; was several 
year:j assistant teacher there, and now occupies th ' position of fir-t as- 
sistant in the Western Female Seminiry, Oxford, Ohio. 

Chaelotte Betts (Mrs. Barnum), sister Dea. James Belts. Teacher. 
Married Rev. Samuel W. Barnum (Y. C. 1841), who was ordained Jan- 



APPENDIX. 109. 

uaiy 25th, 1853. Pastor, Massachusetts, to 1862. Editor "Abrido-ement 
Smith's Bible Dictionary," and other works. Residence, New Haven. 

Makt Kandlb (Mrs. Willard), d. Samuel P. and Sally (Hyatt) Randle. 
Born June 8th, 1821. Studied at Wilton Academy and Utica (N. Y.) Fe- 
male Seminary. Married Rev. S. G. Willard, November 14th, 1849. 
Died at Willimantic, May 15th, 1853. 

CiAEA A. WrLLABD, d. Dr. David W. Born February 4th, 1823. Studied 
in Wilton and Bridgeport. Teacher of private and family school twenty 
years, or more, in Wilton. Author of "Nellie Greyson," "Fifty Years 
Ago," and other works. Died at Norwalk, February I5th, 1876. 

ErizABETH WiLLABD (Mrs. L. J. Curtis), d. Dr. David W. Married, April 
2d, 1850, James G. Rowland (Y. C. 1846), who opened a family school for 
boys in Kent, and died August 20th, 1853. Mrs. B. continued the school, 
and taught till 1864. October 20th, 1864, she married Lewis J. Curtis, of 
Norwalk. 

Mae-j Wellaed (Mrs. Salmon C. Gillett), d. Dr. David W. Studied in 
New Haven. Teacher for years. Residence, Colchester, Ct. 

SusiAN WiLLAED (Mrs. Mix), d. Dr. David W. Taught for a time. May 
1st, 1860, married Rev. Eldridge Mix (Williams College, 1854). He was 
assistant to the Rev. Dr. Hastings (New York) 1860-61; Pastor in Burling- 
ton, Vt., 1862 to August 20th, 1867 ; Pastor First Church in Orange, N. J. 
1867. 

Elizabeth Middlebeook (Mrs. Hill), d. Col. George M. Married, 1856, 
John Hill, M.D., for some years physician and surgeon in Brooklyn, 
N. Y. ; now in South Norwalk. 

LucEETiA MrDDLEBBooK (Mrs. Brown), d. Col. George M. Married Au- 
gustus Brown, lawyer, Ballston, N. Y. Mr. and Mrs. Brown died early. 

Geeteude Middlebeook (Mrs. Turner), d. Col. George M. Married J. 
Edward Turner, M.D., the founder and first Superintendent of the Bing- 
hamton Asylum for Inebriates. They reside in Wilton. 

Haekiet Fitch (Mrs. Gregory), d. J. Piatt Fitch. Married Rev. Abel 
Ogden (Trinity, 1842), some time Rector of St. Matthew's Church, Wilt»n, 
who died 1854 ; married, second time, to Rev. Luther Gregory, Rector 
of St. Paul's Church, Huntington, who died about 1863. 

Maey W. Geegoet (Mrs. Hubbell), d. Charles. Married Rev. James W. 
Hubbell, A.D. 1861. Residence, New Haven. 

Alice Westcott (Mrs. J. G. Davenport), d. George B. Married Rev. 
John G. Davenport, Bridgeport. 

Louisa Randle, daughter George H. and Caroline (Lounsbury) Randle, 
Lady Principal, Seminary, Penn Yan, New York. 

Helen Randle (Mrs. Barnum), d. George. H. Graduate of State Nor- 
mal School. Married Rev. Henry S. Barnum (Y. C. 1862) March 10th, 
1869. Mr. Barnum is in the service of the American Board. They are 
stationed at Van, Eastc rn Turkey. 



110 APPENDIX. 

Sakah Kandlk (Mrs. Steele), d. George H. Married, August 2d, 1865, 
to Rtv. John B. Steele, who was ordained Aug. 16th, 1865, preached 
several years in Western New York, and died November 29th, 1873, aged 
thirty-eight years, at Middlebury, Vt., Avhere she resides. 

Janet Holmes (Mrs. Paine), d. George Holmes. Married Levi L. Paine, 
D.D. (Y. C. 1856), Piofessor of Ecclesiastical History, Theol. Sem., Ban- 
gor, Me. 

Maet a. Davenpobt (Mrs. White), d. George A. Married Dr. Charles 
B. White, surgeon, U.S.A., s»n ©f Dr. Ambrose L. White, and grandson 
of Levi Taylor. 

Mahtha Belden (Mrs. Warren), d. Jolin A. Married, A.D. 1869, Dr. 
Warren, of Norwich, Conn., who died some years ago. 

Clabina Stueges, d. Charles. Graduate Mt. Holyoke. Married. Re- 
sides in Brookfield, Conn. 

Josephine Sttjkges, d. Charles. Graduate Mt. Holyoke. Married O. A. 
G. Todd, lawyer, Danbury. 

Artemesia SirEOEs, d. Charles. Student for a while at Mt. Holyoke. 
Teacher of music. Married. 

Jane D. Middlebbook (Mrs. Foote), d. George B. Married Joseph F. 
Foote, lawyer, Norwalk. 

Elizabeth Middlebbook (Mrs. Barber), d. George B. A.D. 1870, mar- 
ried James W. Barber, M.D,, Norwalk. 

Fbancesca Betts (Mrs. Nesbit), d. John C. Married Rev. Alexander 
Nesbit (graduate of N. Y. Col.), Pastor of the Presbyterian Church, Tre- 
mont, N. Y., who died in 1875. 



LETTERS 

7.V REPLY TO INVITATIONS OF THE COMMITTEE. 

LETTER FROM DR. G. HALL. 

To THE CONGKBGATIONAL CHUUCH IN WiLTON: 

Beloved— Although it is nearly a quarter of a century since my Pastoral connec- 
tion with you was severed, I still retain a lively, affectionate interest in the Church 
of my first loTe. 

It is a matter of eore regret that I could not be present at the late gathering, 
• commemorative of the one hundred and fiftieth year of your existence as an organiza- 
tion: hut a combination of circumstances seemed to render it impracticable. 

The four men who were, perhaps, more Influential than any others in securing 
my settlement in Wilton, about twenty-eight years ago, still survive, and participated 
in your recent festivities. 

These friends, and indeed all who counselled with me respecting my call to your 
parish, were truthful and thoroughly honest in their representations— as is not always 
the case when a new Pastor is sought. They reported to me the exact state of feeling, 
how many voted for me, and how many declined; and their prophecy was, that in six 
months those very ones who took no part in calling me would be among my firmest 



APPENDIX. 1 1 1 

friends. Thif proved true. I found none but friends in the Church and parish 
If. during my stay amontc you, any word was spoken or any act done, out of unkind 
intent towards me, it never came to my knowledge. 

The contract under which I settled in Wilton was more than fulfilled. Liberality 
towards me increased each succeeding year of my Pastorate among you. 

In one respect particularly, as I look back, I admire the kindness and forbearance 
of the long-suffering people. When I recollect that my sermons at times exceeded an 
hour in length, and that the hearers bore it good-naturedly, I think they must have had 
great deference to the "everlasting'' Gospel and great tenderness for the young man 
who spread his matter over such a superficial area. But I suppose they had hope of 
my improvement in this respect, as venerable ministerial brethren had for my ortho- 
doxy when some of the "new school kinks " should be taken out of me. 

I could fill many pages with reminiscences of my short ministry in your town. 
1 remember eome marked characters with whom I had to do. I have my associations 
with visits and hospitality and meetings in Pimpewaug and Kent, and Bald Hill and 
Belden's Hill, and Chicken street and Nod, &c. I recall faithful workers— men and 
women — in these various districts who were an encouragement and a help. We were 
permitted to rejoice together over many souls won to the Kingdom of Christ. These 
fellow-workers, many of them, have gone to their re\iard. 

Eemoval from my Wilton charge was eflected without losing their confidence or 
good will. So that the way has been open for visiting my old parish with delight. It 
has been my privilege to preach at the settlement of two Pastors who succeeded 
me, and I have rejoiced in the good and able men whom yon have had for your 
ministers. May the Lord continue such in a long succession to this ancient and 
honored Church, and maintain a growing, active, faithful membership of men and 
women and children, and send forth, as He has in years past, many to preach the 
Gospel and honor the Christian name in various walks of life ! The Lord bless thee 
.and thy helpers, and make thee a praise and an excellency from generation to 
generation. 

Yours, in abiding aflfection. 

GoRDOK Hall. 
Northampton, Mast., July bth, 1876. 



ABSTRACT OF LETTER RECEIVED FROM REV. S. R. DIMOCK. 

Central City, Col., I 
July 10th, 1876. ) 

Dear Friend Olmstead: Your letter found me on the top of the Rocky Moun- 
tains, whither, perhaps the Lord hath sent me up to die. In my school-boy days I 
read of these mountains, but never dreamed they were to be my future home. Though 
your letter came too late for the grand celebration, yet it made no difference, for the 
distance and expense would have prevented my attendance. Y'et how gladly would I 
have been with you, for I dearly love that ancient Church and the dear people 
to whom I ministered so pleasantly for a year and a half. Though there is little 
piospecr of it at present. 1 still cherish the hope of visiting you again before I die. 

I wish yon in sonif way to assure the people that my affection for them has grown 
stronger and stronger as the years have glided away. And now that the cloud of sor- 
row has lifted in a measure, 1 find the hope reviving that I may, ere long, visit the 
scenes of happy memory, and express in person to my former people my continued con- 
fidence and love. My daughter also (now sixteen) has a strong desire to visit the old 
parsonage where she was born, and form the acquaintance of her father's friends 
whom she was too young to remember. 

Mcst truly yours. 

S. R. Dl-MOCK. 



^ 



112 



APPENDIX. 



LETTER FROM REV. LEWIS GREGORY. 

Lincoln, Nebraska, I 
June 17, 1876 )' 
Mr. Edward Olmbtead: 

Dear Friend— In a letter received from Rev. S. R. Dimock. my predecessor in the 
Church here and now of Central City, Colorado, he said: "Little did I think, when 
preaching in Wilton fifteen years ago, of going out into the Great American Desert to 
prepare the way for one of the boys of my congregation." But so it was to be. And 
from the Desert, now "blossoming as the rose," I send back to the dear mother 
Church and her sons and daughters gathered to observe her birth-day, the heartiest 
greetings Besides the attachment one always feels for the home of his childhood, I 
love the Church as the birth-place and home of my soul. It has always seemed 
to me that the beauty of its landscape, the excellonce of its Academy, the intelligence 
of its ladies, and the many quaint people to be found among Us inhabitants, give 
Wilton a peculiar charm. Though fifteen hundred miles of land separate us, I assure 
vou my heart is with you in the commemoration of the dear old Church's anniversary, 
it may interest some of my old school-mates to know that I am trying to build up the 
cause of Education and Religion in this young State, and have daily reason to th»nk 
God for His blessing upon my labors, and the early Wilton training which fitted me 
for helping to lay the foundations in this new country. 

Our city already numbers eight thousand people, and is rapidly growing. Outside 
of the University towns you could hardly find in the East as large a proportion of 
liberally educated people as here 

Give my love to all enquiring friends, and believe me, 

Ever yours, 

Lewis Gregort. 



LETTER FROM REV. MR. HARVEY. 

[In reply to a letter of inquiry, in which the seven questions were for convenience 
numbered, this letter was received from the Rev. Mr. Harvey. His answer follows 
the order of the questions It was written with no thought of its being published, 
or used in its present form ; but it was so highly prized by those to whom it was 
read that the author, with some reluctance, consents that his friends use it as they 
think best. S. Q. W.] 

Broadway, N Y., I 
June 16th, 1876. f 
Rbv.S.G.Wili. ard: 

Dear Brother— In answer to yours of the 13th, I send the following : 

1. I was born at Jamestown, Chatauqua County, New York. 

2. April 15th, 1825- new style. 

3. I am the son of (^harles R. Harvey, 
which was the son of Rufus " 
which was the son of Jonathan " 
which was the son of William " 
which was the son (if Thomas 

which was the son of William " 

who emigrated to this country from England, and bought what is now the town of 

TauntonTMass , from the Indians for a peck of beans. 

He was the great-grandson of Turner Harvey— a noted archer and warrior, the 
mightiest man with his bow in all England. At his death there was no man in England 
who could spring his bow. He was born about 1500. 

My mother's name was Olive Willard I am proud of my connection with the 
Willard family. Perhaps you may not be ashamed to acknowledge me as your thirty- 
ninth cousin, especially as I am not a Presidential candidate. 

4. Graduated in 1844 at the University of the City of New York. 

5. Imbibed a limited amount of theology at the Union Theological Seminary in 

6. My wife's father's name was Edward Lewis. Her mother's name was Cynthia 
Gildersleeve. of Portland, Conn. My wife is an excellent woman. 

7. "Several other things" must be imagined. My life has been uneventful, except 
four children. I never was burned at the stake, though the "steak" has been too 
often burned for me. 

I do not receive a pension for my services in the late war, nor do I suppose that I 
have any particular claim t^^on the admiration and gratitude of the latest posterity. 
Without oflicial title or honor I wearily toil in the dusty highways of life, and am 
so deaf that I can't hear a man when he asks me for money 

I should be very happy to attend the Wilton Centennial, but poverty clothes me 
with seedy habiliments, and makes me anxious to save my last dollar to buy your 
"Historical Address " I hope, as I believe, that I shall not be missed. With many 
thanks for your kindness, I remain 

Yours truly, 

Wheelock Nyk Harvey. 



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